XPost: or.politics, talk.politics.misc, talk.politics.guns
XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
Who saw that coming?
A bill rolling back Oregon’s pioneering drug decriminalization law is
moving forward in the Legislature, after getting broad support from
lawmakers in both parties.
In a brief hearing on Tuesday evening, a special committee passed out
House Bill 4002 in a 10-2 vote. That outcome bodes well for the bill’s
chances in the full House of Representatives, where it could get a vote
later this week.
The vote held little of the passionate debate that has characterized
discussion of the state’s addiction crisis and how to respond to it. Over hourslong hearings that began last fall, the committee has heard pleas
from family members of drug users, police, business owners, advocates, attorneys and others to address the alarming impacts of fentanyl in the
state. Often those testifying disagreed on the best course of action.
On Tuesday, members of the special Joint Committee on Addiction and
Community Safety Response were measured and in agreement that they needed
to act — even if they weren’t aligned on the particulars.
“Everybody gave a little bit in this process,” said Sen. Tim Knopp, R-
Bend, the Senate minority leader. “We always said that we wanted to have a bipartisan product and I think this is our best opportunity.”
The bill lawmakers landed on would end the state’s three-year experiment
with decriminalization, in which being caught with small amounts of
illicit drugs has been punishable by a ticket. The bill would instead make
such low-level possession a misdemeanor punishable by up to six months in
jail.
Democrats who crafted the proposal say they’ve built in multiple
opportunities for drug users to opt in to treatment in order to dodge
criminal consequences and have their records automatically expunged.
They’ve sold the bill as a way to give law enforcement more authority to
combat public drug use, while at the same time prioritizing public health strategies.
“The ability to make this an unclassified misdemeanor has given us
flexibility to send a message to our courts and our law enforcement
partners, our [district attorneys] and our public defenders about what our expectation is,” said state Rep. Jason Kropf, D-Bend, a committee co-chair
and an architect of the bill.
https://www.opb.org/article/2024/02/27/oregons-drug-recriminalization- bill-sails-through-key-committee-heads-for-house-vote/
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