Senate Standing Committee on Public Safety

Well, good morning, everyone. The Senate Budget Subcommittee number five on corrections in Public Safety and Judiciary, and Labor and Transportation.

Will now come to order. You can tell we're actually friends. We get along. It does exist here in the Capitol. With that, good morning to you all. For today's hearing, we will be hearing all of the panels on the agenda prior to taking any public comment.

The Senate Standing Committee on Public Safety.

Once we have heard from all the panelists, we will have a public comment period. For those who wish to comment on today's topics on today's agenda, and for my colleagues, we will hear from all the speakers on a particular panel before asking questions of those panelists.

We will maintain decorum during this hearing, as it is customary, and any individual who is disruptive may be removed from the hearing room. Before we begin, however, I'd like to make a few opening comments, and before I do that, just reminding the panelists that we're allowing approximately two to three minutes per person.

If you could state that and not read your comments that have already been provided, but actually give us a highlight with that, a few opening comments. As the governor announced yesterday, we have a $12 billion budget problem to solve. We are facing potentially devastating cuts, primarily in health care, in the purview of sub 5, the May revision proposes to cut 50 million from assistance for victims of crimes.

However, the May revise we want to make sure you all know, is just a starting point. And over the next few weeks we, the legislature, will consider these proposals and put forward our own version of the budget to prepare for the upcoming budget negotiations.

We are here today to share the latest information about the implementation of Prop 36. We'll hear caseloads and fiscal updates from state and local stakeholders. Also, it's my understanding that there was not specific funds put in particularly for Prop 36.

So I think it's very important that we have this hearing today to talk about the impacts to the state. At the state level, we're committed to fulfilling our responsibilities. The administration has proposed using the funding mechanism provided by Prop 36 to make a $127 million available for treatment programs from Prop 47 Savings.

The May revision also reflects the impacts of Prop 36 on the state prison population, but successful implementation requires the partnership of cities and counties, especially under these fiscal conditions. We look forward to hearing from many of the local partners today and working closely with them as we move forward towards full implementation of Prop 36.

I believe that's it. With that, I'm going to turn to the co-chairman of this committee for any comments.

Well, thank you very much, Senator Richardson. Good morning, and thank you to everyone for participating in and joining us for this joint informational hearing on the implementation of Prop 36, which is a follow up to the joint hearing we had on this topic in late February.

Our committees have convened once again to discuss the implementation of Proposition 36, which was overwhelmingly approved by California voters last November. Today, we will hear from state and local stakeholders specifically on the fiscal impacts of the implementation of this initiative.

And as many of you know, with the budget deadline quickly approaching, we wanted to meet today to make sure that the budget subcommitee and also our policy committee jointly have the most current information about how this law is being implemented across the state and the fiscal impacts of Prop 36 as the legislature heads into budget discussions.

As the Co-Chair Senator Richardson had touched upon, yesterday we learned via the governor's May revision that our state is facing a $12 billion deficit and as a result, the legislature will spend the next month having difficult conversations about which programs and services to fund, the level of funding for those programs and services that will be allocated.

Notably, there was no specific proposals related to Prop 36 implementation in the governor's May revision, but I want to reiterate that the Senate is committed to implement Prop 36, including budget implementation.

Prop 47 savings will not be enough, and there is a need for shared responsibility between state and local government to ensure effective implementation of this law over the next few years.

It's my hope that in having this hearing today, we will leave with an understanding of the true fiscal impacts of implementing Prop 36 on our state and local governments.

As we head into our budget discussions, I think it's important to acknowledge that implementation is a multi-year endeavor during which time local governments will undoubtedly make adjustments to their approaches. Data will need to be gathered. We have some data that we got today from the state, from the counties.

We need ongoing data, and the state's response to how we implement this voter-proof proposition will continue to evolve in response. So again, today's conversation is designed to help us understand the fiscal picture as it stands now. I want to thank our panelists and everyone for joining us today. I'll turn it back over to Senator Richardson.

Thank you. Chair Arreguín. Are there any members who'd like to make comments before we start with the panelists? And we are asking to please keep the comments at a minimal level if possible. Thank you, Mr. Seyarto.

All right. I think it's really important, and I think the co-chair stated this is we're not here to decide whether we should be implementing Prop 36, we should be deciding how to do it. And I hope our witnesses are going to help us tell us how we're going to implement it.

And it's just not the treatment, and it's just not the incarceration. It's what happens in the middle, too. So there are some very critical elements of what we're going to have to do because this is not us deciding what to do. This is our citizens deciding what we are going to do.

And the reason we got to this point is because we did not act when there was a problem. And I've said this before, that when we don't act, somebody else is going to solve the problem for us. Well, now they have, and 70% of us told us what would they want to have happen.

And so that's our job, is to figure out how we're going to do this in the most expeditious possible way. And we do have money in the budget. I know $12 billion is a huge deficit, but there's a lot of self-inflicted wounds in there.

And so I look forward to having this discussion, figuring out how we're going to do it and what kind of money needs to be put into the system so we can do that first when we're doing the budget.

The current May revise does not have money in the budget to implement this, and that's not an excuse to not implement it. So I applaud our co chair's comments. Yes, we will, and look forward to the discussion.

Thank you. Any other members who'd like to make comments? Seeing none, we're going to move forward with the first panel, and if you would all come forward. Our first panel is on fiscal impacts at the state level. We first have Justin Adelman, Assistant Program Budget Manager for the Department of Finance.

Then Francine Byrne, Director of Criminal Justice Services with the Judicial Council of California. Then the Honorable Lisa Rogan, Presiding Judge of the San Bernardino County Superior Court. Then, Cathy Jefferson, Deputy Director of Office of Research of California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. And then we might, I don't know if there's room there for everyone.

Aaron Maguire, Executive Director of the Board of State and Community Corrections. And Colleen Curtin, Deputy Director of Corrections Planning and Grants Programs, Board of State and Community Corrections. With that, let's start with Justin. And again, we're hoping you can keep your comments to between 2 and 3 minutes. And we're very excited about you being here and the information you have to share. Thank you.

Good morning, Chair and members, Justin Adelman, Department of Finance. So I won't go into the details of Proposition 36 or 47, but I do briefly want to discuss the high-level funding interplay between them. And I'm more than happy to answer any questions you might have.

So the May revision includes 88.5 million for Proposition 36, separated into two components. The first component is associated with the increased cost to house and care for individuals projected to be sent to prison because of Prop 36. These marginal costs include supervision, feeding, clothing, medical, and others.

In total, the May Revision includes approximately 29.3 million for these anticipated costs in 25-26. My colleague from the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation will provide additional information and insight into those projections on the population.

The second component associated with the funding source identified in Proposition 36 itself, which is the Second Chance Fund, which was created by Proposition 47 in 2014. Proposition 47 specifically included kind of a breakout of how those funds from the savings are distributed.

And 65% of those funds go to the State of the Board of State and Community Corrections grant program for public agencies to support mental health treatment, substance abuse treatment and diversion programs for individuals in the criminal justice system, specifically with an emphasis on programs that reduce recidivism for people convicted of less serious crimes and who have substance abuse or mental health problems.

So the total Proposition 47 savings for 25, 26 is 91.1 million. But again, that Proposition specified that 25% goes to the California Department of Corrections, Department of Education, and 10% goes to the California Victim Compensation Board.

So it's that remaining 65%, 49.2 million or so, that goes to the Board of State and Community Corrections through the Second Chance Fund that would be available for local and county governments for funding qualified programs for Proposition 36. We also have colleagues here from the BSCC who can speak to those grant programs.

So again, just in summary, the two avenues total to 88.5 million in Proposition 36 funding for 25-26. And then the dynamic of the funding is expected to kind of shift over the subsequent years. As the prison population due to Proposition 36 increases, the available funding generated by Proposition 47 savings declines.

So it's a little tricky because CDCR isn't really budgeted for out years, but kind of projecting on a rough level, Proposition 36 funding for CDCR would be about 56 million by 27-28. Conversely, Proposition 47 funding would be eroded by those increased costs for state prison.

So the Proposition 47 share that goes to the BSCC would decline to about 17.4 million in 27-28. So the total funding in out years would be less for both, but with more of the emphasis on the state prison costs.

It's again, a very high-level overview of kind of the interplay for this year and then out years, and I'm happy to answer any questions you have. Thank you.

Ms. Byrne. Oh yes, she's next.

Yes. Actually, we can't.

Oh, there we go. Francine Byrne, Judicial Council of California. Thank you, Chair and Members of the Committee. I appreciate the opportunity to come to you again to talk about the impact of Prop 36 on this court system. The courts are committed to implementing Proposition 36 in the most equitable and effective way possible.

But there will be significant workload impacts on the courts. Judge Rogan will talk to you a little bit more about them specifically. Specifically, but I'll speak a little to the numbers that we've gathered. We surveyed the courts in February and received responses from 49 counties whose combined population equals 98% of the state.

It's important to note that this is a point in time survey. We have not yet gone back to resurvey the courts. We may do that in the future. But the information is so volatile at these early stages of implementation, we wanted to get a number to start working with immediately.

So based on the data from those first two months of implementation, we estimate that the courts will receive about 20,000 felony filings annually that would have been filed as misdemeanors were it not for Prop 36.

However, we do know that a certain percentage of these cases, about 20 to 30%, will be associated with higher level felonies, meaning that the courts would have to put in those extra resources to process those cases regardless of Prop 36.

So we will take those out of the big workload impact when we're talking about those numbers, and we get about 15,000 filings that we think will directly impact the court. The difference between processing a misdemeanor case versus a felony case is significant. There are more trials, there are more continuances.

It's a significant amount of work more on the courts. And we have conducted a study a few years back that indicated that each filing is roughly $650 more to have a felony filing rather than a misdemeanor. And, and that number is being looked at right now and will likely go up in the newest research that we're conducting.

So looking just at those operational costs, that's just the time associated with the processing of those cases. However, there's also a whole other side of the administrative costs. Prop 36 requires the courts to work with county behavioral health and other justice system partners in a way that's more intense than typical case processing. There's contracts, there's additional hearings.

Most of the courts, courts are implementing hearings especially for those treatment mandated felony cases that need to be reviewed and treatment success needs to be monitored at all times. There are a lot of much more coordination for court clerks, et cetera, in the background. Judge Rogan will speak to you a little bit more about that.

Some of the concerns that the court stated in the survey was not knowing if there'd be enough availability of both treatment and supervision resources. That's a big concern of the courts. We understand that the spirit of the law is still trying to preserve prison time for the sort of worst case cases.

And if we are going to keep folks in the community, they need to make sure that they're properly monitored and have both treatment and supervision and ongoing judicial monitoring. We know that many of these cases will get funneled through the current drug or mental health or other collaborative courts in the state. But not every court has those.

Not every case will be necessarily appropriate for those for those systems. So many courts are developing their own sort of collaborative court model, Prop 36 cases, but those are currently unfunded. And this is also coming at a time when federal funding for collaborative courts is at risk.

And in fact there are no solicitations currently out right now for any federal funding for the next federal fiscal year for collaborative courts. This is a resource that courts throughout California have largely relied on because there's no statewide funding specific to collaborative courts at this time.

So with that I will end my comments and I'm happy to take questions.

Thank you very much. Honorable Rogan.

Thank you. And thank you for the opportunity to be a part of this discussion on the impacts that the courts are seeing on the ground. And we're talking about. Just closer. Okay, thank you.

And I would remark that Senator Seyarto's comment of what happens in the middle right in between the early on impacts that the courts are experiencing are insufficient to no treatment options. Scant progress or assessment reports, increased numbers of detentions due to the lack of program availability.

So some courts have a better opportunity to implement this in the early stages depending upon their availability of resources beforehand, i.e. the lack of participation in Prop 47 that some courts have seen. They were able to utilize those resources that they had available previously to roll themselves right into a 36 Prop treatment program.

Other courts don't have those resources. And the resources have are as varied as our state is, meaning that some areas, the rural areas as opposed to an urban area, whether or not those treatment options are available to their constituents locally.

I will tell you as an example, San Bernardino is a very large county and so resources for all of our constituents would be difficult to reach each area of our county, meaning that we would have to probably stand up more treatment courts than a smaller court and what resources we have available, both judicial and staff-wise for the under-judged courts.

That's difficult for the courts that are adequately judged. They may have the ability to stand those courts up immediately, but that is going to impact the progress, the success.

And when we're talking about equal access to justice, we would want in the spirit of the law, for every participant to have the same availability of resources that would then roll into the success rate as opposed to ending up in prison. So that's going to have a very big impact.

And when Ms. Byrne talks about the numbers, I would encourage you to look at those with a conservative eye because as we are taking on the early implementation of Prop 36, various counties are either more aggressive in their initial startup as opposed to some who are more measured, waiting to get the resources, the treatment programs readied to allow them.

San Bernardino is taking a very measured approach because they understand that our resources are severely limited. Our judicial ability to stand up a court right now is severely limited due to the fact that we are under-judged, we're the most under-judged county.

Other courts and other counties are being very aggressive in the early filings, but they may have better resources to sustain the aggressiveness of those filings. Not so across the board for sure.

We have had courts, I've reached out to my colleagues over the last couple of days so that I would be prepared to tell you that some counties, their participant increased by 500%. There's no way that you could anticipate having that type of number and be ready for it with without the appropriate funding and resources available.

So while we are wanting the success of Prop 36 in the spirit of which it was passed, which we understand and want to apply evenly, equally so that we have the same success rates or availability of success rates across our state, it's going to require funding.

Not every court is going to need the same amount of funding, but certainly every court is going to need some amount of funding to reach those success rates and get the spirit of this law equally applied throughout our counties. And with that I will. I'm ready for any questions that this panel may have for me.

Thank you. Next we'll have Ms. Jefferson. Good morning.

Good morning, Mr. Chair, Madam Chair, and Members of the Committee. I'm Cathy Jefferson, Deputy Director for the CDCR Office of Research. I'll be providing an overview of the CDCR Spring 2025 projections as they relate specifically to Proposition 36. To predict future populations, CDCR utilizes historical trend data, including data on court commitments.

Our spring projections are an update to the Fall 2024 projections, which are provided through June of 2029. The spring projections include actual data as well as the estimated impact of legislation, policy and process changes in place through December 31, 2024.

So we expect a net 5-year decrease of 3.1% for our institution population from June 30, 2024 to June 30, 2029. Given that the cutoff for the spring cycle is December 31, we maintain the same methodology for estimating the impact of Proposition 36.

However, we made a few adjustments to our assumptions to account for the new information we received as Proposition 36 rolled out and also as part of our discussions with stakeholders. So the first adjustment has to do with admissions. So admissions begin January 2025.

But rather than a full immediate impact, we are assuming a slow gradual increase from January 2025 through February of 2026, at which point admissions would stabilize for the remainder of the projection cycle. This accounts for implementation time for local jurisdictions as well as for individuals who may opt for the mandated treatment.

The second adjustment has to do with parole impact. So length of stay is still assumed to be 11 months at this time. But the rate of release to parole supervision was reduced from 20% to 3% of Prop 36 admissions and the rest are anticipated to go to post-release community supervision instead of parole.

I believe that you were given a handout with the differences for Spring and Fall, so I won't go over that. But I just want to emphasize that the long term impact of Proposition 36 is still evolving. CDCR is monitoring admissions and implementation of Prop 36 very closely.

We will be adjusting our projections and our assumptions to provide a more accurate projection over time and as we receive new data. So thank you and I'm happy to answer any questions you have.

Thank you very much. With that, we'll have Aaron Maguire.

Thank you, Madam Chair, Chair and Members of the Committee. My name is Aaron Maguire. I'm the Executive Director of the Board of State and Community Corrections. Thank you for this opportunity.

What I'd like to do is following on DOF summary just a little bit more of an overview of the Prop 47 Grant Program that the Board administers and the interplay between the Prop 47 Grant Program and what can be funded under Prop 36.

As you're aware, Prop 47 was a 2014 voter-approved initiative that established the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Fund. And as previously mentioned, 65% of that fund is designated so that the BSCC can administer a competitive grant program and that money comes from the savings which were related to the implementation of Prop 47.

The reduction in population at CDCR allowed for state savings and that state savings was deposited in a fund which then we administer part of that to do a competitive grant program.

Since the program's inception, we've administered approximately $617 million that has been provided for the Prop 47 grant program is available to public agencies to provide mental health services, substance use disorder treatment or other diversion programs.

Shortly after the passage of Prop 47, there was follow up legislation in 2015 by Senator Atkins that required the Board to form an Executive Steering Committee with a balanced and diverse membership with expertise in housing and behavioral health and substance use disorder.

And it also expanded the funding and use purposes for that pot of money to allow for housing-related assistance or other community based support services including job skills training, case management and even civil legal services.

One of the requirements that was placed into that grant program was that we require that 50% of the funds that are allocated to those public agencies are then passed through to community-based organizations to administer the treatment programs or other services that are provided.

Subsequent Executive Steering Committees that have looked at the program and the Board have kept that requirement since the original Executive Steering Committee established it. From our point of view, the grant programs that have been funded by Prop 47 have been successful.

We released a statewide evaluation in February of 2024 showing that recidivism rates were for program participants was basically cut in half and compared with other groups.

And what the Board has done historically over the last many years is that we've released a new request for proposals about every two years and the fourth cohort of funding was released in April of 2024.

With the passage of Prop 36 and recognizing there was an additional need in the field to get some money, maybe out into the field a little bit sooner, we decided to rerelease the Prop 47 RFP, which as previously mentioned can be used for mental health treatment and substance use disorder treatment, and specifically noted that the funding could be used to implement Proposition 36 programs, which again can be used for mental health treatment or substance use treatment programs.

In April this year, the Board approved the release of this fifth cohort of funding. As with $127 million made available. And again as previously mentioned, Prop.36 specifically allows the BSCC to allow funds for program for treatment under Prop 36 rather than try to make a distinction between Prop 36 and Prop 47 programs.

Because effectively they can be used for the same type of programs. We just put the RFP out in the field as a Prop 47 RFPL, RFP and then noted again public agencies could use Prop 47 program funds to implement a Prop 36 treatment program.

Applicants can choose to apply either in a small scope category, up to $2 million, or a large scope category for up to $8 million. There's also a specific set aside for Los Angeles County that may submit one application for up to $20 million in funding.

The BSCC anticipates the approval of these awards at the September 2025 board meeting with the three year grant cycle program beginning in October. We recognize that we will be also monitoring the CDCR population projections and fiscal information at the Department of Finance.

And we do anticipate that funding availability for Prop 47 in future years will go down because of the impacts of Prop 36. With me is my colleague, Deputy Director Colleen Curtin, who can answer any other questions, detailed technical questions about the program. And with that, I'm happy to answer any other questions you may have.

Thank you. So, Ms. Curtin, you won't make our presentation? Okay, no problem. First for questions, let me turn to our co-chair, Mr. Arreguin, the Chair of Public Safety, and then we'll go through the Members as appropriate.

Well, thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Just a question to Department of Finance. You had touched upon the changes in estimated funding from Prop 47 savings over the next few years. I think typically my understanding is it's generated 100 million annually.

And the mayor vision projects 91.5 million available, of which I think you said the 65% portion was what, 56 million?

59.2.

59.2. So. What is the projected amount of funding that will be available over the next few years that will be available for grants?

So it declines roughly about a third every year, declining to 17.44 million in 27-28. From 59.2.

Okay. And just, just a quick thank you. And just a question to the Judicial Council. I really appreciate this, this data you provided. We also got some data today from Department of Finance. The...Department of Justice, yes, sorry, from DOJ with the number of arrests under 11395 being about 10,000 arrests since the implementation of this law.

You talked about 20,000 felony filings, most due to Prop 36. And the presiding judge also talked about kind of disparate amount of resources available county by county. We know that Prop 36 is being implemented very differently in different counties. Could you talk about maybe, your honor, as well, the disparate impacts facing county courts.

I know that there were no adjustments in the May revision to provide additional resources to the courts to implement this. So wondering if you can elaborate on just the challenges that courts are facing county by county and what resources are needed to be able to assist in implementation?

Yes, thank you very much for that question. It is being rolled out, as Judge Rogan mentioned, differently, in the different counties, some roughly statewide, the breakdown between the theft and the drug crimes is about 55% now on theft and 45 on drug, which is slightly different than it was the first time I spoke.

And it really depends on the county. So we know that some of the big box stores, for example, are making coordinated efforts in some counties to try to get more emphasis on those theft crimes. And that's reflective in some of our statewide data.

There are other counties that are choosing to, perhaps because of the prevalence of drug crimes or other different reasons, that are emphasizing that more in terms of the resources. We think that both theft and the drug crimes could eventually end up in our collaborative court system.

And again, that is currently not completely resourced in a way that's stable and depending on grants is no longer is not necessarily going to help us achieve what we want to achieve. So we think that it's approximately $25 million that will be needed to implement this effectively. And I will say that's on the conservative side.

I think Judge Rogan will definitely say it's on the conservative side. But between the increased time involved in the felonies versus misdemeanors as well as all the administrative pieces that need to be in place for the infrastructure to really be able to process the cases effectively, we believe that is the number. Judge Rogan?

I would agree that it is a conservative number because what I don't want is for this Committee to walk away and think that this number is going to be reflective, ongoing.

As I mentioned before, there are some counties that are taking a very reserved approach to make sure that the treatment pieces in place and those numbers will definitely go up once those treatment pieces are in place.

And we don't want those counties to suffer a lack of resources in when they get in full swing to have the same amount of support that other counties who are more aggressive at the beginning versus taking that reserved approach.

But what I will say and comment again about the felony treatment, when we talk about how much time it takes a misdemeanor versus a felony, remember that these are now instead of just a plea and go and getting a sentence, these are now treatments.

So the treatment Instead of a four to six month turnaround in that case that the court is going to handle, we're looking at 18 months to two years before that court can move that case out of its system. Right.

So those caseloads are going to to increase and increase because we're not moving them in and out as fast and as quickly as we would have been.

So there's going to be various impacts and a lot of it also will depend upon the District Attorney and how they are going to approach treatment on the theft portion versus the drug portion. And it depends upon the community. Some communities, their pain point is thefts.

If you have those big box stores, if you have a lot of areas that are tend to bring in shoppers and people that are drawn to those locations, they're going to be pushing that theft piece harder as opposed to some rural areas that have more drug problems and are addressing that piece.

So there may be quicker on the theft piece as opposed to the drug charges. So we have to take into consideration where those resources are going. What is the demand of that court? Have they been funded in a way that they can take that on early on or do we have to stand up or provide for them?

The judicial piece, the staffing piece, One piece that I had not anticipated hearing from my colleagues was that their numbers went up so quickly. The one piece that they didn't anticipate was they didn't have sufficient interpreters to interpret for the participants.

Not something that I would have thought of, but certainly an impact to that court and how they were able to serve that community in getting a successful treatment program going as quickly as they could.

So there's a lot of pieces that we need to take into account that will impact the overall success and implementation as intended by this, by Prop 36.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Mr. Seyarto or Mr. Niello? Either one. Which one? Mr. Seyarto?

Oh, thank you. So I have a couple of questions in General for whoever wishes to answer it. On the Prop 47 funding we've identified, it was about $100 million and it's kind of decreasing a little bit.

What programs specifically outside of what we want to do with Prop 36 are those funding and have we have any studies, reports on the effectiveness of those funding?

In other words, did it translate into safer schools and cities or do we have any idea how many people have been treated and if those treatments have been long term successful?

Yeah, I can try to answer that. We did release a study in 2024 showing the effectiveness of the programs. We also have dashboards available on the BSCC website which talks about the various outcomes program participants, number of people served, the types of services that they received. So all of that information is available.

Because my point is if, if we can have that type of effectiveness with those programs, then that kind of translates into what we're doing with Prop 36 and most of the money should be going into that treatment program because we're going to be short treatment programs, just like the judge has noted, but we're also short facilities.

So now I'm going to switch over to the judge on the facilities issue. This is, we have a problem, we have people in the pipeline and the outcome is going to be either CDCR's problem or county jail problem or it's going to be treatment people problem.

And we need to figure out where the treatments are going to be and what facilities they have. And so I guess my question is how are we going to what kind of temporary. Because this is a short term problem and a long term problem. Correct?

So in order to do Prop 36, because we are so behind in our court system, infrastructure development and personnel, we're going to have to come up with a short-term solution.

Correct.

So have you or any of the judicial counsel looked at those short term solutions that we can put a number on so we can make sure those get funded? I hate short term solutions.

But in this particular case, that's what we're faced with and we're going to have to, we're going to have to do that while we work on the longer term solutions.

So one of the solutions that courts are working through now is creating these Prop 36 specific courts that would probably, because of the lack of resources, would not be robust like a normal typical drug court, but would have some of those elements. So ongoing judicial monitoring and an attachment to treatment and reviews, et cetera.

It would really benefit from again, treatment resources and supervision resources. But I think that that is a solution that would be, is has been envisioned in that $25 million figure that courts would have some availability of resources to create that kind of a model.

Okay. Supervision resources, who's going to be supervising?

So it would fall on probation in most counties.

All right, so we're looking at a $60 million cut in probation for the panels. We know that. So that's a, that's also an issue we're going to have to be looking at in the terms of this. From the judicial standpoint, your long term issues are facilities are daunting.

Yes. Facilities, as you know, is an issue in San Bernardino, and I've had the opportunity to present on that, which brings up the resource of transportation for the participants. Long-range transportation, oftentimes in areas where there is no public transportation available. So those are some of the resources that we're looking at. How do we address that?

How do I get a participant from Needles all the way on a four hour drive to the next closest court, that being either Victorville, which I cannot house them there because I don't have the capacity. So you move on to the next court which would be San Bernardino and we're four hours in.

How do I get that transportation? Public transportation from Needles to Victorville? You'd have to go out of the, the state. It takes you into Nevada first and then back into California. That's an entire day for people who have children or work. You can understand the hardship that that presents.

And so we need to look at, and that's what I'm talking about, the resources. Please don't punish the courts that are trying to answer these difficulties early on. And we have a more measured approach because they're real, real difficulties that will go to whether or not we are providing equal access to justice.

Not just access, but equal access. So those are some of the hard questions that we're having to answer and we don't have the answers to them yet other than it will take additional funding to move those participants from one location to another when there are inadequate facilities.

Then I have a question for Department of Finance perhaps have there been any analysis done on what the potential outcomes for the costs of additional victims by not doing funding for this program for Prop 36?

In other words, if we're not able to Fund Prop 36 probably going to have additional issues out there as far as people on the street that are not getting the help that they need and what the cost of that is. That's probably a real study that somebody's going to have to do.

Yeah, I would agree. I'm not aware of anything.

Because if we're going to not spend $100 million and create a 300 $1.0 million problem, then it's probably smarter for us to do the $100.0 million and not get to the point where we have to spend 300 million doing other because of the failure of a program.

So that's what I'm, that's what I'm saying. So that's something that we can be looking at at some point. So I'm going to hold any other questions for other times. Let other people go ahead and ask.

Senator Durazo.

Okay, thank you, I'm not sure exactly who asked all these questions, but you all jump in, volunteer. Maybe this is for the judge. We know that right now there's not enough treatment capacity to meet the needs of all the people who are already referred into the services. And now with Prop 36 there's additional need.

Have you seen examples or do you have thoughts of how courts can meet this need with an underfunded system?

Well, we have several courts that are obviously applying for grants, but other than that, the Department of Behavioral Health, in their attempt to address this need, have been reaching out in various ways. Absent their provision, we talked about probation being involved.

I will tell you that in some counties probation will not get involved because these are, they are not, the participants are not on probation because they have not pled. It's delayed sentencing, so they would not be on probation. And that is Probations out of participating at an early stage.

Some probation departments are providing services, but like I said, it is a varied approach in each county and it really does depend upon the services that were in place prior to Prop 36. What type of services that county was able to provide. Some counties were not able to provide much of anything. Some counties, nothing.

I will tell you that I have been approached to start up Prop 36 courts. I cannot, San Bernardino cannot start a Prop 36 court. I have to place those cases in every single trial court because I don't have the judicial resources to delegate to that specific. And we need it, but there's just not the resources available at this time. So I don't have the answer without adequate funding.

Thank you. The cost of incarcerating someone, I've seen different numbers, anywhere between 100, 132,000, somewhere, probably closer to 132. In addition to poverty and homelessness, untreated mental illness and substance abuse disorders, they're a major underlying cause of getting involved in the legal system.

I think when voters passed Prop 36 it was their intent to have people receive treatment was a big part of what the voters were told in order to reduce contacts with the system. So how do you make sure that happens?

Speak a little to the jumping up? Yes, because I wanted to mention that one of the things that would probably help with the resource allocation is conducting pre- comprehensive risk needs assessment. But again that takes resources to do. But the concept would be to identify the highest risk, highest need people and devote most of those resources there.

I think that those are the ones that would be most concentrated on. So that would be one of the things that if we had additional resources that the courts could implement. There are assessments already available that the courts could use and some are already using it. But that would be one way to get at some of this.

Anybody else could jump in if you want. Due to Prop 36, I think we can anticipate there'll be significantly less funding for trauma recovery centers from the Prop 47 funding in future years. How do.

If you can talk a little bit more about how the trauma recovery centers help the people that you serve and what's the impact of losing this funding on helping people recover from trauma.

So unfortunately, the trauma recovery centers are run from the California Victim Compensation Board. We don't have a representative here from them, but they do receive that 10% of the Prop 47 grants and we can follow up with your office on more information about how those are used.

Okay. Any other thoughts on that? No. There's already a big disparity in total spending for prosecutors versus spending for public defenders. Will this lead to disparities in Prop 36 related sentencing and a overburdened prison system like we've seen in the past?

I will say that's why I emphasized to make sure that the counties are funded sufficiently because you are absolutely right, there would be a difference. And I'll just give an example. San Bernardino has no courts currently devoted to Prop 36. There are other counties who have three or four courts devoted to Prop 36.

So what is the realization of someone in San Bernardino being successful and ending up back in a full life with family versus in one of those other counties that had better ability to succeed in the program?

It's really important to make sure that we are funding sufficiently and equally to allow that each participant have the same ability of success rate no matter where they are in the state.

Okay, for now. Thank you all very much. Mr. Niello, excuse me, Senator Niello.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Two questions, one for Department of Finance. If you included this in your remarks, I apologize, I missed it, but can you explain to us the rationale of the Administration for not including funding for the treatment piece of Proposition 36?

Sure. So, I will note that, as noted in the February Hearing on Proposition 36, the LAO noted that the state is not required to pay local costs for funding for county issues.

So, things like Medi-Cal, Behavioral Health, that would be kind of a county responsibility, which is why the Administration did not include specific funding for those purposes. Again, the Proposition itself had a funding stream identified with the Second Chance Fund for grants for those programs.

And counties can apply, but as far as funding specific county initiatives, it's just not a state responsibility.

So, the votes of 70% of the voters in that election saying that's a high priority for them absolves the states from assisting in funding the mandated services?

Again, I can't speak or speculate on the, you know, desire of the voters, but we are funding the state responsibility of the state prison costs and the Second Chance Fund.

My question was rhetorical. I don't understand that. It's beyond my comprehension. I think for the Court's question, what is the difference in the process of the treatment-mandated felony in Prop 36 versus Drug Court, as it existed before Proposition 47?

The difference in the process is, in Drug Court, it's typically an early plea. So, they are placed on probation. Probationary services are brought in, at that stage, and they have several wraparound services, housing, depending on what their needs are. This is completely different because there is no early plea. It is a delayed sentencing.

So, the courts are then required to—if probation doesn't take part early on, the court has the additional mandate of overseeing and monitoring any type of treatment program, whereas if probation were in on the Prop 47 typical or Drug Court, they have those services available to them.

So, there's less of a strain on the court system, as far as judicial staff, judicial and staffing, because there's not that oversight that we currently now have to do with Prop 36.

So, I think the—I agree with Senator Durazo that many people voted for Proposition 36 with the idea that people were going to get treatment and be cured of their substance abuse issues, which has become much more prevalent, obviously since, particularly since Proposition 47 the—is—within the requirements of Proposition 36. Is there any way to make the process a little closer to what it was under the Drug Court treatment?

The way that it is written, I don't see that as an option because there's no pre plea. So, the hook, so to speak, is a little less and requires more judicial oversight, whereas with Prop 36, there's not going to be as an aggressive and I don't want to—an aggressive in a good way.

Supportive is probably the better word—from other services i.e. probation, to allow for that success rate.

So, excuse me, the involvement of probation appears to be a very important piece of the Proposition 36 process.

It gives you a lot more oversight and guidance. As you know, treatment is a series of successes and failures, and you can't take each failure as the end all be all to, to remove these people from the program. That's expected.

But as much support as we can give them in their daily life provides for a better rate of success.

And I don't know if we have anybody from probation here, certainly not on the panel, but to the extent that you're familiar, to what end does the significant reduction in funding to probation, that's in the May Revise, affect that—if that funding was there, would they be able better to participate?

Mr. Niello, that's our, I believe our third panel. We have probation.

Okay, but with regard to probation, I guess then I'll just make the point that in addition to the state deciding Proposition 36 is almost entirely the responsibility of counties and not the state, beyond not funding the treatment piece of that, there is a double whammy of reducing funding to probation, which makes the state ignoring shared responsibility on this just that much worse.

A proactive budget cut to make it even more impossible to implement. It's almost like at the state level, they want this thing to fail.

Well, Mr. Niello, I would say that's why we're here today. You know, the Governor provided his May Revise, but we, as an equal branch of government, have an opportunity based upon this hearing and the information we're learning to provide that to the Governor and suggest something otherwise. So, I welcome doing that with you.

Yeah.

And I'm sure we all do.

And, and I'm being a little bit pointed.

I understand.

And—but it's, it's purposeful.

I understand. Yes, sir. Senator Wahab.

Thank you. So, we just heard from one of our members that it almost seems like this is projected, or expected, to fail. I want to highlight to the public, as well, that we had an info hearing before the November Election that put this, you know, in law and people voted on it.

We had testimony from proponents of this measure that stated that there is no real true funding mechanism, that retail theft is not going to be necessarily prioritized, right, which is another reason why so many people voted for this.

Assuming that, you know, the car break ins and the fentanyl issue in California and much more are going to be prioritized. Prop 36 was sold as if it would do something for that and it is 100% false.

And it was stated by that, by the proponents of this measure, that it won't lead to reduced retail theft or anything like that. And so, I want to highlight that again.

I also want to highlight the fact that when we did have that info hearing, it was also very clearly stated that the counties are going to have to figure this out, and there is no true consultation with the counties. We have 58 counties in the State of California.

Each of them, as you said, you know, equal access to justice. I can say that there is no equal access to justice when there is not equal revenue measures within those counties. I represent Alameda County and Santa Clara County, two vastly different counties. One far more wealthier and affluent, one not so much.

One that had a DA recalled, one that has had a DA for a number of years there, stable. My concern with this is how 58 counties, that are financially extremely different, are going to enact justice equally. Do we have any commentary from a statewide level of implementation how that's going to happen?

How are the rural counties going to provide all these substance abuse treatment efforts, versus a more wealthier county? Anybody got comments? No. So, I also want to highlight that we have clearly seen, through the budget as well as even the most recent commentary on what's going to happen, that there may be potentially another prison closer—closure.

Number two, the prison population has also reduced and it has been continuously being reduced, right? A couple of years ago was 99,000. Now it's, what, roughly 91,000 and going down. I personally am just frustrated with the lack of long-term thinking and a holistic approach to public safety, right?

I fully support the public in their need for justice. I'm completely aware that we need more of that and especially as we go deeper into the types of crimes that are happening and much more.

But if we are not able to fund this, and if you saw the most recent conversations about the budget is that we are all Democrats and Republicans trying to Fund Prop 36 and its implementation. But this was a disaster on arrival.

And I want to highlight, because there was a lack of funding, there was a lack of coordination, there was a lack of communication with the locals that do push this.

And so, when we're talking about probation officers, when we're talking about officers in general, being able to do the work that they do, we have, across the board, across the state, vacancy rates that are higher than other departments, right? We have problems retaining the current officers we have, let alone probation officers, right?

Let alone even the prison guards, right? We have structural deficits to our public safety infrastructure, as a whole. I will also highlight that when we are talking about prison closures, those are problems as well for the state. One, because it does serve, especially in the rural areas, as an economic hub, right?

They created jobs, they have, you know, communities built around them, a lot of services built around them, community-based organizations built around them, and we are also packing people, grown adults, into tighter quarters.

And I have gone on a number of different tours, both in the prisons, as well as the jails, and oftentimes, they show you the nicest parts of their jails and their facilities, where there are maybe just two people in a cell or, you know, they show you primarily the mental health and substance abuse wards where somebody is being worked to get out of whatever high they're on, or maybe, you know, being evaluated for mental illness or something like that.

These facilities have still triple stack bunk beds, with nearly 100 people, hundred men, and much more, in a particular room and so forth. There is a lack of dignity there and it creates, also, a lot more tension, even for those that are trying to guard them and maintain peace.

A couple weeks ago in our hearing, I highlighted the fact that there was a stabbing, a melee, if you will, a riot of some sort. And that is, you know, some had certain services offered to them, others did not. And so, when we're talking about even rehab and rehabilitation in our prison system, we are not funding it.

We do not have the programs for it. We are not doing enough. So, I say that all to highlight the deep disappointment in how we have been taking a look and piecemealing public safety efforts. Piecemealing.

We are not prioritizing the safety and security of the individual officer or the guard, let alone the inmate themselves, when we are talking about substance abuse in these programs, which are deeply needed in communities. And the programs are also needed prior to even a sentence, which we do not create, right? We do not fund those programs.

So, take a look at our budget and see how many community-based organizations we are pretty much effectively killing off. So, I say all of this with deep respect for the work that is needed and has to be done and the crisis that you guys are now going to deal with.

And the public going to see first and foremost. So, just because it's on the ballot doesn't mean it's well written, doesn't mean that it's safeguarding anybody's rights, or future, or protection. I want to ask one question of you all. What are we doing to ensure that youth are not caught up in the Prop 36 effort?

And as you guys know, there were no safeguards for youth offenders. So, please.

When you, when you ask that they're not caught up in Prop. 36?

Meaning if youth that may partake in, you know, questionable activities and they are under the age of 18, how are we ensuring that we are protecting them so they don't have an entire future that is derailed because of a record and because of, you know, the effort that we are again, not prioritizing them and the fact that they're minors and they make mistakes?

It's very different than, you know, a 35-year-old making a similar mistake.

Right. Right.

Senator Wahab, I'm sorry. Given our time and it is going—Honorable Rogan, if you could briefly answer the question and then maybe we could provide subsequent information to answer these questions more in detail. Ms. Durazo had one quick follow up. I, because of time, I'm not even going to be able to get answers to my questions.

I'm going to ask that you provide them. So, just real briefly to the best of your ability and then, those else who could chime in with helpful impacts to youth, we're going to ask that you please do that after the hearing. Okay.

Are they gone? So, very briefly, I will tell you that the, and I will admit that I don't—I have not surveyed the entire state as far as how the youth are being addressed, but in San Bernardino, the same services that had been provided and I will tell you that they have not been—there has been some, some issue with getting their participation in treatment programs. Prop 47 has really, really eliminated a lot of the participation, which is unfortunate because so many success stories do come from that.

But we still have earnest efforts to make sure that the youth are provided with all of the programs that we can give them, given the funding that we currently have.

Thank you. Ms. Durazo, real quickly.

Yeah. I just want to find, if I can, centralized the new costs associated with Prop 36, and we don't have to, you don't have to line them up all right now. But we're trying to figure out this budget and Prop 36.

So, new costs, I guess with local jails, community supervision, mental health, substance use disorders, but at the state level, because that's the budget we're dealing with now, and the courts, of course. So, if that could be centralized for us, that would be really good for me. Thank you very much.

Alrighty. Everyone, thank you. Before you depart, I just have a few things to follow up but won't require answers right now. One, Mr. Maguire, if you could please provide the body with the 2024 Report. Ms. Byrne, could you please provide us with updated numbers? You mentioned these numbers were for the first two months.

If you could give us the numbers, hopefully through April, and then, I was going to ask if you could give them to us each quarter.

And if it's of the agreement of this body, it's probably a good idea that we do this hearing again in January so we would have the full year to make an analysis of what happened. In terms of the court numbers of what was provided to us, it states here that these are Prop 36 total arrests and also, what was it? Convictions.

Is it possible to determine how—and I'm getting at the question Ms. Durazo was asking—what's the difference between what happened in 47 and what happened in 36?

So, is it possible to understand of these arrest numbers? Would these have been the same numbers with Prop 47, or are these new numbers because of the additional requirements? It really doesn't help us to determine the difference between 47 and 36. And the reason why that's important is when it comes to a funding perspective, that's why we need to know the answer to that question.

And Mr. Adelman, you mentioned that the state is only focused, if I heard you correctly, on the state prison costs, but not on the treatment cost, and you gave us some statistics or information, data, and said Prop 36 funding was available of 88.5 million, and so on.

Could you also provide to this Committee, would that have been the same amount of money you would have provided for Prop 47? Meaning, is there any difference here or are you just saying these are the same dollars?

And if it's the same dollars, we're hearing from the other people who are testifying saying, yeah, but it's not the same workload, so there's going to need to be some adjustment. And then, finally, Ms.—I know your first name is Cathy. I apologize, ma' am, for your—Ms. Jefferson. Thank you.

It seems you also stated that you're expecting a 3.1% decline, which is completely inconsistent with what we're hearing so far. I know that you said February 26th you expected it to level off and begin to decline, but it doesn't even sound like we've ramped up to even implement this program throughout the entire state.

So, how we'd be actually declining six months from now, really, I don't know that those numbers match. When we had the last hearing, we also cautioned you and said the 3,000 number seemed highly unrealistic. And it's proving, I believe that to be the case.

So, we'd really like, if possible, for you to come back with a more reflective—of consistent—of what you're saying and what we're hearing of the people who are doing the work, because it's the numbers aren't jiving together with that. All of my information can be provided after because we really do need to keep going.

We have two more panels and being respective of their time. But you guys were wonderful. You helped to paint the picture for us of what's happening, which is what we desperately need. We look forward to continuing working with you and implementing this program as the public has desired. With that, thank you very much.

And as we transition to the next panel, I'll be taking over facilitation for the next two panels. And let me just make a very brief editorial comment, which I think was illustrated by the testimony we just heard, which is around Prop 47 savings. I think this is particularly important, given the Governor's comments yesterday.

The amount available for grants is going to go to 17.4 million in 2027-2028. All the while the data we get from the Department of Justice says that, already to date, the number of arrests under 11395, the treatment mandated felony, is now 10,000 arrests and that number is going to increase.

So, there is a decrease in funding and an increase in cases and that's why we have to step in. We're not going to solve this just by money through Prop 47 because that number is going to keep going down. So, with that we'll move to the next panel, and I want to call up our panelists.

San Ramon Police Chief from the East Bay, welcome. Denton Carlson, who's representing the California Police Chiefs Association; Orange County Sheriff, Don Barnes; President of the California State Sheriff's Association, and Monterey County District Attorney; Jeannine Pacioni, Vice President of the California District Attorneys Association. Thank you for waiting patiently and good—still morning.

And we'll go first to Chief Carlson and thank you for joining us today.

All right, good morning, Chairs and Committee Members. Denton Carlson, the Chief of Police for the City of San Ramon and also, Executive Committee Member for the California Police Chiefs Association.

So, I appreciate your time and attention today, and I'm here on behalf of my colleagues, the 335 Municipal Police Chiefs in California, but also on behalf of our communities. They've been desperately asking for our help to address their public safety concerns and with their voice that was heard in November on Prop 36.

We're here to talk to you about how that's going to impact us. So, I want to start by saying that it is not our goal, nor should it ever be our goal, to enforce Prop 36 solely through arrest, prosecution, and incarceration. And to be honest, it's a fool's errand.

History has told us that. We need to address this holistically, as Prop 36 states we should, and we are in full agreement of that approach. It's a measured approach, it's a stationed approach, and different things need to be done for different situations. I want to make it clear that we are in support of that holistic approach.

But I want to say that without strong law enforcement intervention, these problems are only going to persist and grow. They start with us, as your local law enforcement, sheriff's departments, police departments. That's where this begins. And it is going to be burdensome on our organizations, with this increased enforcement.

And the basics of all these successful operations really start with the necessary information, because it all begins with the proper evidentiary information and the proper data points that we're able to collect. Now, in our industry, technology that has modernized over the years has given us more data than we've ever had in history.

But that data comes with a monetary cost. It also comes with the staffing costs, but we have to ensure those systems are in place because we do utilize equipment, cameras, technologies across the board, to be able to successfully respond to these cases and successfully prosecute these cases.

And so, again, those come with a dollar amount, as well as staff time associated with it. And one of the biggest things that we need is the analytics on the back end. Because if we are going to ask our personnel to go line by line of everything that's in there, it's going to overburden our agencies.

We need the technology in place, but we also need to have the provisions and the authorization to do it responsibly, to use those technologies in proper law enforcement directives and ways that are again, responsible and utilized to ensure the public privacy concerns are acknowledged and the safeguards are in place, to ensure that we're not overstepping our grounds into those privacy concerns.

So, but on top those things, we need capacity because as I mentioned, these aren't just dollar amounts that we're going to see. It's staff time that comes with all of these calls for service. Because in general, these are calls for service that are response-generated calls for service.

Speaking specifically to my organization, our traffic stops have diminished over the years, and I believe, statewide, those numbers continue to go down. It's responding to these calls for service, that are community-generated, that are increasing the burden. And so, we need to be able to have the capacity to respond to those increased calls for service.

And a lot of our organizations have benefited from state-funded programs. But again, those grant funded programs are now going to be running out and municipalities across the state have already acknowledged that we may not be able to keep these programs going if the state funding is restricted.

So, on top of all those things, we all know about some of the federal Executive Orders that have come into play. We know that we are at risk of losing funding. The DOJ has made comments—they've made statements that are ordering the pause of certain federal funds for sanctuary states. For that, that's a significant impact in law enforcement.

We rely on tens of millions of dollars, if not hundreds of millions of dollars of federal funding every year. For the California Police Chiefs Association, for the 96% of our surveyed agencies, state they rely on federal funding on a year-to-year basis.

Now, that comes in the form of task force, it comes in force, technology, all of those different components, and if that is lost for us, it's going to have a major impact on our operational capabilities.

So, it's with all of these factors that I'm here to discuss this with you, to work in partnership on making this a successful operation from the local law enforcement level, because it's going to take an effort from everyone to make this be successful.

So, with that I'm here to answer your questions and again, I appreciate your partnership in working towards this together.

Thank you so much, Chief. We'll go next to Sheriff Barnes.

Thank you, Chairwoman Richardson, Chairman Arreguin. I appreciate the opportunity to be here today. As discussed, Proposition 36 passed—I'll give a different number, 7 of 10, rather than percentages—that's more than 2/3 of our constituents in the state said they wanted change and expect us, not just locals, not just counties, but the state.

They're anticipating that we are going to collaborate in a way to solve this problem that we've been addressing over the last several years. Years reduced crime, dealing with fentanyl. Finally, addressing drug addiction, especially drug addiction within our homeless populations.

As a Sheriff, the 58 Sheriffs, we have taken this mandate very serious, prior to Prop 36 and since, to take some initiatives and implement them. The tools that it takes are going to be complex. There isn't any one solution to solve this problem.

It's doing many things simultaneously that will put us in a position to address the impacts that we've all been dealing with. Specific to jails, I run in the largest jails in the nation. We have been working to address the mental health problem.

We've been working to address the drug addiction problem, substance assessment use disorder, the homelessness problem that cycles in and out of jails on a regular basis, and really, the proliferation of some policy-driven criminality that may be adjusted with Prop 36.

For example, the Orange County Jail, just 10 years ago, had 22% of our people in our care had a daily nexus to mental health. That is more than double 10 years later, to 54%. More than one in two people in my care has a daily nexus to mental health treatment.

On any given day, I have 200 people being medically supervised, detoxed off of narcotics or alcohol, and at one point, I had 1,300 people in medication-assisted treatment.

Investments we have made over time, on our county dollars, to be in the game and help these people get back on their feet, get them back into mental health stability, get them into sobriety, and solve that problem.

In fact, last year, we recognized, nationally, by the National Institute of Corrections, for the programs we've started in Orange County, in our jail system. I like to—I appreciate the comments about investment at the local level. The OC Cares Initiative in Orange County, to date, has invested $674 million spent in planned or one-time costs.

85% of those monies are local dollars and not state dollars, and we have ongoing costs of $24 million a year. Despite these efforts, we still face the challenge of people cycling in and out of our jail on a regular basis.

One example of that is an individual, prior to Prop 36, in the Prop 47 environment, going back just five years, who was convicted more than 100 times and is now in custody—now, on a Prop 36-related offense—and, what I'm sad to say, but I'm also glad for, is perhaps, for the first time, being given the opportunity to get into sobriety because of the programs we now have available for him.

The targeted sanctions in Prop 36, like treatment-mandated felonies, is an opportunity to stop the cycle of recidivism.

Put a different way, I can't get somebody into sobriety 10 times a year in three-day increments. We now have the opportunity to encourage them into sobriety, in a way that will longtime sustain success and give them their lives back. But there's going to be a lot of challenges along the way. This has been said several times.

Obviously, we need this Fund. Prop 36. I'm very disappointed that the Governor did not put funding in his May Revise, but I think collaterally, we have to look at this not as an expense. This is an investment into our constituents.

Our community as a way to get people back on their feet. And we need to invest both directions when I say that we need to go upstream in the perfect world.

The way I envision this as people seeking sobriety before they even enter the justice system, but getting the programs to get them back into sobriety and on their feet.

And I need that warm handoff for people in my care when they leave our jail to go into post release programs to help maintain their sobriety and their mental health. I'm here to answer any questions you may have of me and I thank you for this opportunity.

Thank you so much, Sheriff, Madam District Attorney, still morning.

Thank you. First of all, I'd like to thank Chair Richardson and Arreguin and Senator Seyarto and Niello for vocalizing support for understanding that Support for Prop 36 funding is important and needs to be addressed. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today.

I want to begin not with policy, but with a personal story, one that I believe reflects what's happening, this quiet crisis that's happening in families all across California. In my family, the struggle began when my brother was 13 years old and began using cannabis. We assumed it was a temporary thing, it was a phase.

But then it was cocaine and it was heroin and methamphetamine. And then we began a long years and years painful cycle of addiction with arrests, incarceration, relapse, each time deeper than the last. For our family, it was devastating.

We lived in a constant loop of hope when he was seeking out treatment with our support, despair when he failed out, didn't go through with it, disappointment when he reoffended, and guilt about what we could and couldn't do to try and help him. Addiction didn't just consume him, it consumed our family.

We spent thousands of dollars trying to get him help. We pushed for treatment, paid for legal fees, found housing, anything we could do. But the reality was he was so deep into his addiction that he was not capable of voluntarily walking into treatment.

It wasn't until he was incentivized by being incarcerated where things came together, where he received a structure, support, accountability, where that changed. And when he was released on parole, he was clean. Today he now has a job with the labor union.

He is self sustaining, he has pride and is 63 years old and is just now getting his life back. That's why I'm here today. I speak for the California District Attorneys Association, one of 58 elected Das statewide. But we're not here to talk about funding prosecutors.

We are asking you to fund behavioral health and probation services because that's where the real need is. I know that you are struggling in a budget deficit and you have difficult decisions to make. But I ask you to protect the most vulnerable Californians by fully funding the various services that will make Prop 36 a success.

This was passed with overwhelming support. Many of you have said it, everybody over here has said it. In my county, which is quite a diverse county, it passed with a 63% approval rate because voters understood that the policy and the data confirm treatment works and rehabilitation is a better answer than incarceration.

And this is a prosecutor saying this because I've seen this in the past 30 plus years I've been a prosecutor. This does work and it also saves families and enhances public safety. In the grand scheme of our budget, these programs are not very expensive. In fact they save money.

Under President Obama's program, every dollar invested saved $2. With this type of treatment, it reduces recidivism, it lowers incarceration costs and eases the burden on our courts and jails.

And I can't speak for other counties, but in our county our behavioral health is using Medi-Cal funding to off offset some of the costs associated with our Prop 36 cases. So it's not, it's, it's actually deferring some of the costs and ultimately those will be reimbursable to the county.

But the real value again is beyond the numbers. It's the lives reclaimed, the families restored in our community safer as policymakers contemplate their budget choices. Our hope is that you view implementing the voters will as one of those with a priority.

Clearly the voters want to provide treatment instead of incarceration in addition to not funding Prop 36 implementation. We are deeply disappointed in the may revise and particularly with the sweep of pre-trial funding for probation services. The real losers are not the DA's, it's not probation departments, it's not even the local behavioral health departments.

It's the individuals who would otherwise benefit from being treated versus being incarcerated. I ask that you don't let Prop 36 become an unfunded promise and let it be a turning point for Californians just like it was for my family. And I thank you for your time and I'm open for any questions.

Thank you Madam DA. Thank you to our panel, our law enforcement leaders for being here. Turn to the co-chair, Senator Richardson to ask if you have any opening questions and then to the other Members of the Committee.

Yes, in the essence of time I'll just ask my questions and if you could provide them to the Committee. That'll help us there. Sheriff, I really like your approach and how you speak and you talk about other people. You're really a good example of the type of law enforcement that we need. So thank you for your service.

Could you please provide to the Committee the data that you talked about, some of the numbers. I don't have it here in my packet, so if you already did, I apologize. But if you didn't, if you could, because the data is very important if we're going to look to.

Not if, as we seek to fully Fund Prop 36, we really need the data to reference. And yours was very helpful, ma' am, as our DA, your comments also I found particularly helpful because it really speaks the truth of what our focus should be.

I would just only ask if you could provide to us the district attorneys within your area, well, within California, have they experienced an increase now that Prop 36 has been implemented? And if so, what is that approximate percentage that you're seeing? And if we could have those numbers, it'll help us to move forward. That's it. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other questions? Okay, Senator Seyarto, and then Niello.

Thank you. I kind of want to clarify because people are thinking incarceration versus drug treatment, but when they are incarcerated, they get drug treatment. And I think they're picking between not going to jail and getting drug treatment and getting incarcerated, which will make them get drug treatment. What option we're leaving out is you do nothing.

And that's why we're trying to fund this, and that's why we're trying to do that. The question for the District Attorney, do you think your brother is pretty hypothetical, but you would know, would he be clean if he was not incarcerated at some point to get him off these drugs?

Yeah. So I think it's important for us to keep in mind that we're not just. We're not incarcerating to punish. We're incarcerating because they just absolutely refuse to get help. And that way we can help them. So thank you.

No.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. Two questions. And if you could answer them fairly briefly now, and if the more detail needs to come, you can get back to me.

But similar to what I asked before, is there anything in the language of Proposition 36 that either implies or expresses that the requirements of Proposition 36 are almost exclusively local government responsibility with no state responsibility?

And secondly, specifically for the District Attorney, are there ways, as I asked before, that perhaps the treatment mandated felony process could be more similar to and more Streamlined and less resource demanding to the previous drug court process.

I don't believe Prop 36 has any reference to who is responsible. So it does not specifically say the county or cities are exclusively responsible. It's just a mandate. And our interpretation is it's a mandate for all governments, state and local government. As to the Prop 36 versus 47 treatment.

I don't mean to interrupt, but I guess I am interrupting. But I'm not referring to Proposition 47. I'm referring to drug court as it existed and was frankly pretty successful before Proposition 47.

Right. Well, we operate them together in Monterey County. So we have Prop 36 cases and drug treatment court cases together. The difference is of course that, well, actually they're identical in that there's a plea in both.

So I don't know what's happening down in San Bernardino, but in order to handle a Prop 36 case, if you're going to go through the mandated treatment, there's a plea required in that as well. It's true that probation is not providing services to support Prop 36.

At this point, they feel like they don't have enough resources to provide that kind of support. So there is additional commitment by the court to monitor those Prop 36 returns. But otherwise I don't really know how to address your question other than that's what's happening.

Thank you. Any other questions from Committee Members? Just a question to either our chief or sheriff. What other sources of funding, including AB109 funding, are local departments utilizing or considering utilizing to offset the costs of implementation?

So I'm wondering if you know, based on your experience or what you've been talking to your colleagues about, I just want to lift up the really impressive work that you're doing in Orange County. I just texted Senator Umberg and was raving about what you're doing. So I'm wondering if, like, what are.

I know we have the grants that we just talked about. There's a new RP cycle. Are you looking at applying for some of those grants? What other funding sources are you looking at in terms of implementation?

So for us, when you talk about implementation in our organization, specifically we were awarded. We were one of the recipients of the Organized Retail Theft Prevention grant. And that has been our primary source of funding. It was a $5.6 million grant over the course of 44 months.

Again, those are expiring and we're in the position where we may not be able to maintain those programs that we've established. And as it specifically relates to theft related crimes We've established organized retail theft suppression teams and those are statewide.

They've been ramped up and incredibly successful in the community safety aspect and again creating the partnerships between the business communities and the policing agencies or sheriff's departments to be able to respond to these crimes appropriately.

And we now have situations where our retailers are calling our officers directly on their work cell phones because that connection has been made and the response to the incidents as they're happening is exponentially greater.

Yes, Chairman, regarding AB109 funding, that was specific funding, that's for a different purpose. There may be some overlap and some programmatic. But shifting AB109, I know you're not proposing that, but just this may come up or be proposed as a solution. Shifting AB109 funding to Fund Prop 36 creates a different gap.

So we're just moving pots of money back and forth that still creates the same deficit. And regarding the impacts prior to Prop 47, it's not a Prop 47 issue. But most of those who committed these drug related felonies spent their time in county jails, not in state prison.

In fact, very few of them went to state prison for those felony drug charges. And now with AB109, even if they're sentenced to state prison, it's one of the three nons, they're going to come right back and serve their time back in county jail. So I can't say that there won't be impacts.

I can tell you that we looked at the data in Orange County. The rest that we've had as far as I think there's short term spikes that we'll see. I think that will level out over time and long term we'll see the benefit of that.

And this investment will pay off later as we get people in sobriety and they do not come back into the systems repeatedly. That will give us the cost segments. We just have to invest now to save later.

Yeah, I think the point you just made is I think very important because we just heard from Department of Finance and CDCR about their estimates around the people that will be in the state prison system. But a lot of the stuff's going to be dealt with at the county level.

So I think that's an important thing for us to emphasize with regard to impacts to consider and to the DA in my last question, obviously there are lots of different laws that you could utilize to charge somebody with for an offense. This is providing a new set of tools for people.

Do you see your prosecutors using the provisions of 36 more regularly than using other aspects of the law. Could you talk a little bit just sort of the uptick in cases that you've been dealing with since the the effective date of the law?

In Monterey County we review about 15,000 cases a year and we file anywhere from 11 to 12,000 cases. Majority of those are misdemeanors. We file approximately 2,000, maybe 3,000 felonies. It just depends on the year. Since the, since Prop 36 was passed December 18, we have had 90 cases total between 6661 and 11359.

Not a huge burden on our office in terms of the amount of cases coming in. We have more narcotics offenses than we do theft offenses. And we attribute that because retail stores are still not calling law enforcement because they don't realize that there might be some remedy there for them. And so that's where we're attributing that.

Yeah. Similarly in my county, Alameda County, we're seeing more of the treatment mandatan felony offenses as opposed to the retail theft offenses. My understanding based on my conversation with the District Attorney, I just want to just Clarify, you know, 47 obviously changed prosecution of these lower level offenses and made them misdemeanors.

36 is making them a felony and is has increased penalties. So just clarifying that as a matter of record. Thank you. Thank you so much for taking the time to be here for your work on behalf of our state. We're going to at this time, unless there's any other questions, transition to our next panel.

Thank you very much. Just offer anybody, if you want to see anything we're doing in Orange County is an open invitation. I would be very interested. We'll thank you sir. Okay. We're going to go now to our last panel.

Then I'll turn it back over to our co chair And I'd like to invite San Joaquin County Chief Probation Officer Steve Jackson, who is the President of the Chief Probation Officers of California. I know that Senator Niello had some questions around how this is impacting probation.

We have the county public defender for Los Angeles County, Ricardo Garcia, representing the California Public Defenders Association and Michelle Cabrera, the Executive Director of the California Behavioral Health Directors Association. Now good afternoon and I will now turn over to Chief Jackson to kick things off.

Yes, good morning and thank you for the opportunity. Again Chair Richardson and Co-Chair Arreguin and Members just appreciate the opportunity to speak and I'll keep my comments brief and hopefully allow time for some questions.

But as you could hear from the the panels earlier we appreciate the support and it actually caused me to move away from the comments that I did have prepared because you did hear a lot of good things.

But I will tell you that, you know, there's one common thing that you've heard this morning that will make this Prop successful and that's the probation department. You heard that two times as a solution from the questions that you asked from two of our witnesses of what would make this work. And that's the probation department.

And that's just not from a supervision level. I mean we're talking from the pre trial implementation, from collaborative court implementation, treatment coordination and obviously monitoring. And you also heard from, you know, from the failure perspective from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation on that end with the PRCs, that too results in supervision from the probation department.

So you know, we do have impacts and I'll talk about an example shortly. But we do have a budget ask and that's $47 million. And that starts from the pre trial coordination of efforts all the way through supervision. And we think that's important to scale up.

We definitely need a strong foundation, long term solution to implement Prop 36 effectively. As you heard too, there's one agency that is a conduit to each one of the court, Behavioral Health and our clients, and that's the probation Department.

So I just want to end with, you know, you heard today a couple scenarios where the Probation Department isn't involved in, you know, necessarily Prop 36 Court or Drug Court, but we're all kind of implementing in different phases, obviously because of the lack of funding and whether we're expanding the caseloads or workload of other officers.

But I can speak directly in San Joaquin county, not only do we run a robust drug court program, but we have established a separate Prop 36 calendar outside of that date, which we do have a probation officer appear, monitor treatment progress and supervise. So there's a lot of good examples of what we're doing statewide.

Obviously we do need to ramp up and scale that funding so that we can implement this appropriately. So I'd be happy to share and answer any questions that you may have and I'll forgive my time to my partners here. Thank you very much. Okay, we'll go next to Mr.

Garcia.

Thank you. Good afternoon, chair and Members of this Committee. You know I'm Ricardo Garcia, I'm the Los Angeles County Public Defender. I'm also here as a board Member of the California Public Defenders Association.

Looking at the impact of Prop 36 is critical from the defense perspective because we are the individuals that deal with the persons who pulled in to the criminal system up front. In Los Angeles alone, we handle one quarter of the state's population, to think about it that way.

And of that, 33,000 of the indigent individuals pulled into the criminal legal system are processed through Los Angeles from the entire state. 33,000 individuals. Current data shows that Los Angeles County is filing more Prop 36 cases actually and per capita than anywhere else in the state.

To give you an example, since December when it was implemented, we've seen an aggressive increase in the number of people charged under Penal Code 6661, which is the theft offense. To start just as of Monday today actually to yesterday, there were 40 people in Los Angeles charged under that section.

And since the beginning of the the law, we're looking at 863 people in Los Angeles alone that had filed under that statute alone. In addition to that, since December, we've seen 518 individuals charged under 11359 and again since Monday, 62 filed in Los Angeles County alone.

So to be clear, these numbers do not include some misdemeanor filings from our different city attorneys across the county county that could then be forwarded to the District Attorney's office. These are strictly cases filed by our District Attorney in Los Angeles County.

The increase of felony filings in Los Angeles County does and will continue to increase the jail population. The fact is that our sheriff themselves have noted a substantial increase in jail to population bookings exclusively for Prop 36 since December.

To give you an example of that, in December we were looking at about 12 people when it first started booked under Prop 36. As of May 8th of this year, we've had 594 individuals booked just under Prop 36. So we are seeing in LA that we have filed more than twice as many theft enhancements as diversion cases.

And we're seeing a tilt clearly towards criminalization as opposed to treatment. Los Angeles, where the vast majority of the people charged and jailed under Prop 36 are unhoused, I believe we're seeing a regression. Instead of focusing on healing and rehabilitation for this vulnerable population, the system itself is defaulting to punishment, that is incarceration, short and long term.

Before Prop 36, the Criminal Legal system in counties such as Los Angeles were already stressed for resources. We didn't have sufficient funding across the criminal legal process, but certainly for indigent defense.

The Legislative Analyst, as you heard, estimates that Prop 36 will increase local criminal justice costs by tens of millions of dollars because of the decrease in Prop 47 revenue and the increase of cost because of Prop 36. So we're not seeing an increase in revenue to protect us from what's going to come economically from Prop 36.

This increase creates really and honestly an existential crisis within the criminal legal system. Treatment mandates which exist under Prop 36 are meaningless when there's no bed to send a person to. I think it's important to understand they are meaningless when there's nowhere to put a person.

The system sets clients up to fail by offering diversion without an infrastructure. And that's what we have. We have mandates with nowhere to place people and the goal of giving them diversion opportunity with no real infrastructure to ensure that that's going to happen.

Further, Prop 36 treatment based mandates also create more work fundamentally for public defenders across the State of California. Again, I'll give you an example in Los Angeles, which is a Care first county public defenders. There we want to connect our clients to every possible service.

However, the increase in filings and limited resources make this incredibly difficult and challenge our care first vision in being able to ensure that our clients are getting the appropriate treatment with people. As we've heard even from a colleague District Attorney that that's the key, getting people healed, not just caged.

When the state is not required to pay for increased costs, something that the Senator has brought up several times to implement new legislation like Prop 36, it compounds the challenge that counties have in implementing these types of laws.

So while there's not enough to resolve the challenges, currently the Public Defenders Association is pushing for $120 million support, public defense, holistic advocacy.

And now this isn't going to solve all the problems, but it really is a strong and first step to give us the tools to help those individuals that are brought into the system that we want to get treatment for that Prop 36 defines should be getting treatment.

If we have this additional cost, excuse me, this additional amount of individuals being pulled into the system, we have a drop in structural revenue and we don't have the resources within public defender offices because we've already strapped economically and resource wise to handle what existed before Prop 36. We are creating an impossibility for counties across California.

So with that, I want to thank you for your attention and I'm here for any questions. Thank you, sir.

Thank you, Mr. Cabrera. I'll turn it over to you.

Thank you so much and good afternoon. Good afternoon, chairs and Members. Michelle Cabrera with the County Behavioral Health Directors Association of California.

CBHDA represents the county behavioral health agencies in all 58 counties serving the mental health and substance use disorder needs of Californians under Medi-Cal and through a variety of safety net programs from prevention and crisis through to acute and residential care.

I want to thank the committees for including our perspective today on implementation, including the costs that would be needed for treatment in order to implement Prop 36. As we've heard today and in many other venues, treatment works, recovery happens and it's an immensely positive and beneficial return on investment both intergenerationally and society wide.

Since the early stages of Prop 36, CBHDA has worked closely with our Members to understand how implementation is happening which as we've talked about today, there's a lot of discretion at the local level. County Behavioral Health has been involved, however, in all cases from day one in assisting with providing evaluation and treatment and the corresponding services.

In order to determine what services are necessary for each person involved in a new treatment mandated felony, they have to be assessed first. Staff must prepare a service, a report for the court and all the parties and provide ongoing monitoring and input as it relates to successful completion of their treatment plan.

We have worked with our members based on actual data and to date we find that county behavioral health agencies will need to add somewhere between 100 and 200 staff at a cost to the stay of 95 to 213 million annually. This includes funding for evaluations, court related activities and reports and treatment to individuals who reach that completion.

Currently, California has two primary, but I will say inadequate sources of funding for substance use disorder treatment services. The first is federal grant funding. We get this depending on what's budgeted by the Federal Government. So it's very peaceful piecemeal grants based and a small percentage of our overall funding.

This funding can in some cases include things like drug courts that we've heard about today. The second main source that we've also heard about today is Medi-Cal.

Now, counties put up the non-federal share of services for Medi-Cal, not the state for the most part, and we rely on dedicated state taxes through either realignment or our millionaires tax to fund that non federal share.

These revenues that we get from the state are not tied to caseload or need and they certainly do not adjust when new initiatives are put into place like this one.

It is important to note regarding Proposition one, which is the revision of the millionaires tax that while it allows counties to use that millionaires tax now and ongoing for substance use disorder needs and a goal that we long supported, it was designed prior to the existence of Prop 36 in addition, Prop 1 did not add funding to county behavioral health, but rather represents a shift in how those funds are used to reflect a stronger emphasis on state funding priorities like a new requirement for housing, new treatment models and new reporting requirements.

Counties will already have to make tough decisions at the local level as certain programs funded in the past for mental health through community processes will either be shifted to the state like for prevention and workforce, or phased out entirely.

These changes will be enacted over the course of the next year, but the bottom line is that the vast majority of Prop 1 funds have already been spoken for, either through historic programs that are going to be continued, including Medi-Cal Services, or or through shifts that we'll need to make the new funded state priorities known.

It's also not commonly known that Medi-Cal coverage for inpatient and residential substance use disorder services as a whole is new. In fact, California was the very first state in the country to pass a Medicaid waiver or an exception to those rules that would otherwise prohibit Medicaid from paying for residential and inpatient sudden treatment.

This pilot was approved by the Federal Government in 2016 and has been slowly implemented throughout the course of the last eight years.

With the newest counties coming on at the end of last year, counties have had to front load the cost of standing up this new program within existing revenues again, and we've done it because we see the incredible benefit that it is to our beneficiaries to have more comprehensive substance use disorder treatment services.

But I just want to emphasize the counties that have been left behind with this organized delivery drug treatments pilot are largely rural communities. And it's just I just don't think it's commonly understood that historically Medicaid has not paid for these services. Our capacity has been challenged as well by a severe lack of access to commercial insurance.

And as you know, this initiative is not limited to Medi-Cal, so I thought it was important to mention that. In conclusion, I just want to thank the Committee again for your attention to these issues.

We know that at the end of the day, a robust treatment system fully supported across an array of payer sources is critical to address the complex needs of individuals who are struggling with substance use disorders, their family members and communities.

And we want to continue to work closely with our state and local partners to prioritize access to care for those who need it. Thank you.

Thank you so very much. For all the panelists, go first to Senator Richardson to ask if you have any questions for the panel.

Just two questions for all of you. One any of you who provided statistics, which I believe it were both of you, could you please provide them to the Committee? Extremely, extremely helpful. Again, the only way we're, I believe we're going to get these numbers, we have to prove it, and you will help us to do that.

And my last is just a comment. I'm very encouraged by all of you who are here today, your approach and your work. I mean, you're doing your part. We just need to not just say thank you, but give you the resources to do it. So I'm very encouraged by hearing from all of you. Thank you.

Thank you. Any other questions from Committee Members, we'll go to senator Seyarto and we'll come to this side.

Thank you all very much. Yes, Mr. Jackson?

Yes.

Good afternoon. I wanted to ask you, as you said, the role of probation has come up several times by different people. So could you explain why the role of probation is so important in the softball?

Why it's so important and has it changed pre Prop 36 and post Prop 36?

I think our role has always been defined as who we are. I mean, we are the agency that is uniquely balanced to provide opportunity and accountability. And I think that's exactly what Prop 36 prescribes.

I think when you look at the Probation Department, not only do you get a service provider or a broker per se, but you also get that community supervision aspect.

You know, not only do we provide resources to people, but we're a linkage to services in the community, not to mention just the court and behavioral health and what we do. But you know, we provide our clients access to community based organizations. That's a lot of of what we do.

So I think it's invaluable that you really have to scale up our ability to continue to provide those resources to the folks we supervise and get them to the appropriate care. If not, you force us to make a choice on who we're going to serve and who we just don't have the capacity to do so.

And so it starts as early as the pretrial phase and assessment through assisting the court and all the way through supervision. So you know, it obviously, you know, it was a big hit yesterday as mentioned and I think I had the word double whammy in my notes.

You know, probation departments provided, you know, 70 million, I think, annually to provide, you know, pretrial services, assessment and pre trial monitoring. That was even before Prop 36. So that workload had already increased and then you hear that it's been, you know, cut by 20 million annually to 50.

So again we talk about you're either going to increase the workload of others or, you know, we heard mentioned about other grants, but it's really hard to do the work now that it's expanded without a funding formula to do that and make it possible.

So just a little follow up. Do you see the need for your Department to change post-Prop 36 or your role and your, you know, your responsibilities remain the same? It's a matter of more funding to do it, is that?

Yeah. So the services that we would provide Prop 36 clients is nothing unusual that we've already done and what we do every day, but we don't have the capacity to do it without funding. Just like the other agencies that you've heard this morning.

Okay, thank you. And Mr. Garcia, I had asked this question earlier of another panel about the disparity in spending for prosecutors versus public defenders. So how do you see, will there, could this lead to disparities in Prop 36 related sentencing?

Absolutely.

And the prison system?

Thank you for that question. Absolutely. The disparity between resourcing of public defense and prosecution across the State of California is incredibly disparate. In some smaller rural counties, it's a five to one difference, meaning prosecutors receive five times the resourcing as a Public Defender's Office.

In larger counties like Los Angeles, it's a little bit closer, but still there's a difference in the amount of resourcing we get.

A key to that resourcing that isn't often spoken about is that prosecuting agencies as well as law enforcement, we heard from the chief, receive a significant amount of federal and or state funding for specialized projects, whatever they might be. Public defenders are then not given any kind of resourcing to offset that.

And so when you consider that as their resourcing goes up to prosecute cases under Prop 36 or any specialized offense, every individual that's brought into the criminal.

Well, not every single one, but the vast majority of the individuals that are brought into the criminal legal system, those increase in numbers for that specialized team come to public defender offices, and we don't receive an offset in funding of any way to make up for that increased number.

So we're always, regardless of the resourcing of public defense across states, whether it's five-to-one or two-to-one, we're always behind the eight ball and difficult to catch up. What that does, both actually and in the future is it increases the workload on the individuals that work in public defender offices who are dedicated.

And the way I like to describe it is I remember when my boys were little, my youngest one loved to play with cars, Matchbox cars, and he would line them up and take them all out of the box. And as it was time to go, he wanted to get them out and he'd have to pick them up.

And at some point in time he leans over and one of those cars falls out. And as he reaches down to grab it, another one falls out. And if you've had kids that are small, you see that happening. And so eventually they get frustrated.

There's too many cars to hold without the resources, whether it's another bucket, whether it's someone else to help. That's what happens when these caseloads go up for public defenders. At some point in time there's just too many to hold. Could even work within the process and provide the resources that we want them to have for the clients.

That's a direct impact.

That's all. Thank you.

Thank you. We'll go next to Senator Seyarto and Senator Niello.

Thank you. Mr. Chair. I spoke on the floor this morning about. We were talking about foster care. That when I was elected to the County Board of Supervisors, the first few months was an extremely steep learning curve, the steepest I'd ever experienced. Counties deal with so many things that I just didn't know about before.

And one of the things I learned was the absolute crucial role of probation and public defense to our system of justice, particularly criminal justice. I don't think there was a time that I did not fully approve every request by the Probation Department and the Public Defender in our each of our annual budget exercises.

Having said that, I know what happened to Probation's funding request relative to the May revise, and I think I know what happened to the Public Defender and Behavior Health request. But do I gather that the request that you made relative to Proposition 36 implementation was not addressed at all in the May revise?

I don't have that information currently to know whether it was addressed specifically. It's something that we're looking for support in, so I can't answer that right now. You made the request prior to the release of the. Yeah, I wasn't given. Meaning I wasn't informed today before I came today. But I can provide that information moving forward.

All right. I'd be curious about that. And behavioral health.

Not that we're aware of.

Okay.

And you're right. Yeah. We made that request before the May revise, too.

It's not in the budget.

No.

Senator Niello. Any other questions or comments? Okay. Senator Seyarto.

To the last comment. I think it's obvious by today, all of the panels, how important all of these various positions are in the system. And the system isn't about generating more and more patients and incarcerated people.

The system is about. We have to make the system work to address the load that we have so that later on we won't have as many people that are in the system, which will help us reduce costs throughout the system. And, uh, but we really, that's, to me, that's the importance of why we need to invest in all of these areas so that we can make the system work right.

And work right means people that are breaking into stores aren't breaking the stores anymore. They've learned their lesson. And then the people that are on drugs are off drugs and they're leading productive lives.

That's where we're trying to hit. And so thank you guys all for your input today. I still haven't heard the number. I need the number. How much money we have to invest yearly to make everybody whole. So the system will work. Right. And we can be the most.

And that can be most beneficial to the people that are currently just want to access and play in that system, which are all of our folks out there. Thank you.

Ms. Cabrera, you said 95 to 213 million annually needed to increase the capacity to meet the need that California will have to face given this new Proposition.

Correct. That's to add new staff. It also accounts for costs related to court time, for example, which is not reimbursable under insurance.

And then probation at 47 million. That's for ongoing support for the courts providing individual assessment for treatment options and then for supervision. Supervision, the other component. And then the public defenders. Your ask was 120 million over three years.

That's right.

So. Oh, meaning in addition to the cut that the May revised made? Good question.

We would certainly like to be made whole on the Senate Bill 129 pretrial money. Yeah. So on top, we'd like to be whole. Yes, sir.

Okay. Any other questions from Committee Members? I'll just ask a question. Whoever would like to elaborate before we wrap up. In the absence of additional funding or the level of funding that you need or requested, how will the additional workload and duties be managed?

I can tell you what we're doing specifically is expanding the workload of our current officers. Second, what you're going to do is you're going to start choosing who's more important to supervis or provide, which is not appropriate.

I can say for County Behavioral Health. We're going to be in a double bind. On the one hand, we're going to have our local courts and law enforcement partners telling us that we must address the treatment needs of individuals coming through this as a matter of justice and due process.

On the other hand, we're going to have MediCal beneficiaries who are competing for those same scarce beds to the degree that we end up with people who are waiting for services and who are MediCal eligible. We will be potentially given sanctions by the department for a failure to meet timely access to medically necessary care.

And it will create this sort of have have-nots in terms of who can get into those scarce beds.

In our offices are sort of two parts that's going to happen. At some point, the amount of cars that any individual can hold become too many and it'll go on to an alternate office or to the panel office.

Because the Constitution requires counties to pay for indigent defense, the county will have to pay for the representation of those clients in one way or another, whether it's through the Public Defender's Office or another agency.

And what happens is, as we don't have the facilities or the resources to place people in, individuals sit in jail rather than going to treatment and they will decompensate and we'll have more and more individuals who are breaking down, recycling back into the system because they won't be able to hold them in the jail.

And those individuals being the majority unhoused. Our crisis with the unhoused population in California will only grow and will only get worse. And so if we don't address this directly with the resources that these our agencies need, that public defenders need, in a handful of years, it's going to be exponentially worse.

Thank you all so very much for the work you do and for being here today. I'll turn it back over to Senator Richardson.

I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude. I just had one more because I checked my notes, if I could. Thank you.

Mr. Garcia, you mentioned something and maybe we could answer this in addition to verbally, maybe in writing, but you mentioned something about treatment versus jails and you gave us some numbers about how there were far more people going - if I understood it right - far more people going to jail than the treatment.

Did I understand that right? Could you just quickly elaborate on that?

Right.

I had not heart that.

They're filing more cases that don't apply, that don't qualify for diversion. Pre-plea diversion. Diversion is pre plea. And so, for example, in Los Angeles we have a very successful program called the Rapid Diversion Program.

And that program allows for misdemeanors and people charged with low-level felonies to go through a pre-plea diversion. Since its inception, we've had about 3,000 people that have been accepted into the program and 1,000 have graduated successfully.

So these are individuals who have addiction and mental health issues, that don't sit in jail, that don't wait for a program from jail, that are immediately put into a program from not being in custody. This is just one program as an example. It's incredibly successful.

And so I've seen in the graduations that I go to, which in my work in the near 30 years I've been doing this, there's not a lot of super happy moments.

But I'll tell you, sit through a graduation of this and you walk out feeling pretty light because these are men and women children who are reunited with their parents, are going back to school, are opening up businesses. Incredible things that we want to see in our community that become paying taxpayer- taxpayers.

They want to be part of the community. This is without a conviction, without a plea of guilty, and with a program that is supported by many of our mental health partners in the counties. The difference is that when a person goes into custody under the Prop 36 cases and sits there and has to wait in jail.

So that's the difference. They have to wait in jail before they get this treatment. Things start to spiral out of control negatively. And when you don't have sufficient beds, it sets it up for failure. As I mentioned earlier, people can't get the program.

And I will add just one bit of the statistics show, and we can provide those, individuals who provided supportive services pre without incarceral, without being placed in jail, are more successful. Return to court and successfully complete programs at an equal, if not higher level than individuals who were initially held in county jail.

So county jail does not add a benefit whatsoever to the treatment process. It doesn't make people better. It makes them worse.

Thank you.

Okay. Unless there are any other questions. Thank you so very much. I'll turn it back over to Senator Richardson.

Well, thank you very much. We are now moving to the part of the public participation we'd like to move on to anyone who'd like to provide public comment.

Due to constraints regarding the length of our hearing today, each individual speaker is limited to 1 minute. Please line up at the microphone over here to your left. Now, if you'd like to participate in the public comment portion of this hearing.

Good afternoon, chairs and Members. Tara Gamboa-Eastman with the Steinberg Institute. Really appreciate today's discussion. We're urging the Legislature to invest $105 million to expand behavioral health treatment capacity. Proposition 36 essentially created a right to care for those charged with treatment mandated felonies. But that right is meaningless without the infrastructure to support it.

Our substance use treatment system is impacted and under resourced that care will inevitably be delayed or denied without additional resources. We must build the capacity to uphold the promise of the law. To ensure that care is evidence based and individualized, it is also critical that treatment decisions are made by qualified behavioral health clinicians using established standards like the ASAM criteria.

Finally, it is essential that we monitor the employment implementation of Proposition 36 with a robust data framework to ensure we are achieving the outcomes voters are expecting. Thank you.

Thank you.

Danica Rodarmel providing comment on behalf of Vera California, the LA Public Defenders Union - Local 148, ACLU Cal Action and Initiate Justice. When Californians voted for Prop 36 they were promised evidence-based treatment, housing solutions and programs that would bring communities health and safety.

So we urge the Legislature to fund programs that will connect people who have been arrested to housing, behavioral treatment and victim services centers. Funding these programs is even more necessary after Prop 36 because it is increasing incarceration which will worsen cycles of homelessness, drug use and community safe stability.

Investing in solutions like drug treatment and job training doesn't just change lives, it strengthens communities and prevents crime before it happens.

We also urge the Legislature to invest the $120 million in holistic indigent defense services and include Debt Free Justice California's request to eliminate six criminal administrative fees related to drug treatment and diversion in any Prop 36 package. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Good afternoon Chair and Members. Asher Waite-Jones on behalf of Debt Free Justice California. We urged the Legislature to eliminate six criminal administrative fees related to drug treatment and diversion and discharge uncollectible debt related to these fees.

Voters made it clear that people facing drug related charges should receive treatment and financial barriers make that impossible for many Californians in the criminal legal system. Drug treatment and drug diversion are not free. Criminal defendants must be able to pay these fees or face up to three years of incarceration and a felony conviction.

Criminal justice outcomes should not be determined by someone's inability or ability to pay. These fees worsen California families' affordability crisis, triggering long-term financial instability. Close to 40% of California households cannot make ends meet, 60% of which are black and brown families.

These fees compound the criminalization of poverty and cost families, courts and taxpayers more treatment, reduces recidivism and saves costs. Please ensure that we support these essential services.

Thank you.

Good afternoon. Glenn Backes representing two organizations, the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and Drug Policy Alliance. We support the implementation of Prop 36 through a focus on health not harm.

We're encouraged by the rollout of Prop 1, investing $3 billion in substance use disorder and mental health care throughout the state. We also support the cautions and expertise of the County Behavioral Health Directors. We encourage the Legislature to support efforts to remove barriers to accessing voluntary drug treatment, especially for low-income and unhoused Californians.

We support funding indigent defense, backfill of lost Prop 47 funding, removing fees that are barriers to treatment access, and fully funding housing and health policies that promote health not harm. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, good afternoon. Thank you both chairs, Committee and staff. Ryan Morimune with the California State Association of Counties, representing all 58 counties. First and foremost, deep appreciation to both committees as well as Senate leadership for their continual support and efforts to provide critical funding for Prop 36 implementation across all of our agencies and departments.

And then in the interest of time, just would like to share a brief statement, joint statement from actually two of our supervisors that are on our Executive Committee that actually shared opposing views and they state that we didn't see eye to eye on Prop 36, but we both agree on this. Nearly 70% of Californians voted yes.

And the state budget must reflect the will of the people. Every county is starting from a different place. Some need to scale up treatment programs, others need more staff and facilities. But all need flexible, reliable funding to implement effectively.

That's the only way to turn the promise of this ballot measure into real on the ground results to meet the will of California voters. Excuse me and thank you for the consideration.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Chairs and Members. My name is Trent Murphy. I'm here with the California Association of Alcohol and Drug Program Executives, also known as CADPE. We're the only statewide Association that represents community-based substance use disorder providers.

We're here a part of the coalition of behavioral health associations and organizations being led by the Steinberg Institute, urging the Legislature to allocate $105 million to expand access to substance use disorder treatment capacity. Because without treatment, people with addiction would just be funneled into incarceration.

And lastly, treatment placement decisions must be made by qualified SUD professionals using ASAM criteria, not courts and law enforcement. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair and Members. Kapri Walker with Californians for Safety and Justice. The proponents of Prop 36 said, and I quote, there's no risk a person will sit-in jail because treatment is unavailable. They repeatedly stated that this would not be a return to mass incarceration.

But as you've heard today, the Proposition did not provide any implementation plan or funding strategy to implement ensure accountability for these promises. This oversight makes it difficult to determine how much is being spent and whether these dollars are achieving the desired outcomes.

Without clear guidelines, there is no way for the nearly 70% of voters who supported Prop 36 to know if it's delivering on all of its promises. This is why we recommend that the Governor and the Legislature collect and report data on all of the outcomes for all individuals impacted by Prop 36.

Additionally, Prop 36 will reduce funding for already proven effective programs funded by the savings from Prop 47. And because of this, CSJ is requesting General funds to submit to supplement Prop 47 savings and maintain at least $115 million annually ongoing for the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Fund. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hello. Kate Chatfield, Executive Director of the California Public Defenders Association, speaking on behalf of CPDA and Smart Justice California. And I am urging the the Legislature on behalf of these organizations to invest the 120 million in public defenders offices so they can provide holistic defense services over the next three years.

It is true that in passing Prop 36, voters were told that this was about treatment and about housing. So now we're asking the Legislature to make good on that promise.

And holistic investing in holistic indigent defense teams that includes social workers, housing specialists, mental health professionals and other frontline staff is not only implementing what the voters want, but it will also create long-term savings by addressing the root causes of the situations that lead people into the criminal legal system in the first place.

So thank you very much for your time. Thank you for holding this hearing today and thank you for all your work.

Ma'am, if I could clarify, you said the 120 million which we had heard before. But then you referenced over three years. Is that request...

It is a request of 120 million over three years, which is nowhere near what public defenders offices need. But yeah, that's the request.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Chair and Committee Members. My name is Zach Cefalu. I'm here today on behalf of the League of California Cities. First, CalCities would like to thank you all for your interest and support in implementing Prop 36.

CalCities has been a strong supporter of Prop 36 and believes that in order to effectively and fully implement this measure, additional resources are needed to address the increased demands on our county probation systems, our behavioral health treatment facilities, our local jail capacities, and as well as other services that are needed to connect those suffering from substance use disorders with their appropriate treatments, as well as hold repeat retail theft offenders accountable.

CalCities has been in strong support of the critical component of Prop 36 that grants diversion to those in need of treatment. And as such, CalCities is here today in strong support of the budget request from the Chief Probation Officers of California as well as the County Behavioral Health Directors Association.

Cities remain effectively committed to the implementation of Prop 36, and our cities are here today urging the Legislature to fully fund and implement Prop 36 in the will of the California voters. Thank you all.

Did you memorize all that?

Yes, ma'am, I did. I appreciate it.

That was excellent.

Thank you very much.

Thank you. Yes, ma' am. No memorization required, but quite impressive. Yes.

Good afternoon. My name is Melanie Kim, State Policy Director at the San Francisco Public Defender's Office. We urge the Legislature to invest 120 million over three years in holistic indigent defense services. Holistic indigent defense teams are uniquely able to connect individuals to appropriate resources because they understand the complex legal, social and economic issues faced by their clients.

We meet our clients at critical junctures in their lives and build trust with them and their families when they are more likely to be open to receiving treatment and receiving other services that stabilize their lives and significantly reduce the likelihood of recidivism. Thank you for your work and for this hearing.

Thank you.

Matty Hayek from California Civil Liberties Advocacy. I don't have anything memorized. I'm sorry, I'm going to have to read from my notes here. We supported the implementation of Prop 47 a decade ago. We submitted amendments, met with legislative offices and advocated for a very balanced implementation.

And this year we are actively tracking and weighing in on bills affecting the implementation of Prop 36. We just want to state that if the Governor believes they can't implement this law due to funding or capacity, that it should probably be stated honestly, not quietly defunded through the May revise.

Public trust in the initiative process depends on transparency. If this is about policy disagreement, then why don't we just call it that? But let's not pretend that the will of the voters is being honored while actively undermining it behind the scenes. Public trust in the initiative process depends on transparency.

We seek to balance the will of the voters with the constitutional rights of all Californians. If this is about policy disagreement, why don't we just say so? But why are we undermining the implementation while claiming to honor it? That's all we have to say. Thank you.

Thank you. Seeing no further individuals for public comment. Having completed that, area Members, are there any additional questions or comments? Okay. Thank you again to all of our panelists for joining us today, for the sergeants looking out for us and the great staff, and actually for two committees working well together. Would you like to close?

Oh, yeah. We thank you, all of our panelists who took the time to come to Sacramento to testify on this very important issue and all the public comment that we received. Just to emphasize if you were not able to participate, you can submit written comments either to Senate Budget Subcommitee Number Five or the Senate Public Safety Committee.

You can visit, you can submit comments through the online portal on the Committee's website. Your comments and suggestions are important to the Senate, and we will include your comments in the official hearing records. And we thank you for your participation.