Criminal Justice Reform is the civil rights issue of our time. And Arizona is ground zero for reform efforts. Compared to other states, Arizona has one of the harshest criminal justice systems in the nation.
We have the 4th highest incarceration rate among all the states; we are among a handful of states that still impose mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent offenses; our laws allow prosecutors to stack charges so defendants who have no prior convictions are treated as repeat offenders; and our drug laws are exceptionally hard. We are the only state in the U.S. that continues to treat simple possession of even small amounts of marijuana as a felony. And not just marijuana. Possession of drug paraphernalia, and that could be something as simple as a wrapping paper, something that is typically a petty misdemeanor if it’s a crime at all, can be charged as a felony in Arizona.
Today there are 42,000 people in our state prisons. And another 12,000 in our local jails. The budget for our state prison system is roughly 10% of our annual state budget—over a billion dollars a year. And that doesn’t include the cost of local and state police, judges and probation officers and court personnel. These expenditures have bought us a criminal justice system with nearly a 40% recidivism rate. Once you enter Arizona’s prison system, you are very likely to return.
Everyone wants a safe community. Everyone agrees that public safety is the first duty of Government. But given these huge costs, isn’t it time to ask if we are getting what we are paying for? Isn’t it time to ask if there might be better ways to do things?
This is why we have launched the Arizona Project for Criminal Justice Reform.