THE MANDATORY minimum sentencing measure on this November’s ballot has strong support across the state—except from the groups it’s actually supposed to help.
An Elway Research poll conducted last week show that about 60 percent of Oregonians support Measure 73, perennial “tough on crime” politico Kevin Mannix’s current effort to get stiffer mandatory sentences for repeat drunk drivers and sex offenders.
But the measure’s toughest critics are surprising: prison guards and advocates for victims of sexual violence.
While common sense suggests crime victims’ groups and prison guards would back a measure that promises to put people behind bars for longer, the groups worry that the new mandatory minimums would actually hurt public safety in the state.
Measure 73’s mandate to make third-time DUIIs a class C felony and extend the minimum prison time of a repeat felony sex offender from 100 months to 300 months will consume an estimated $61.5 million to $92.7 million in state funds over the next five years. Sexual violence resource groups fear the state will suck that money from already poorly funded programs for domestic violence prevention and survivors. Sexual assault victims groups across the state also complain that the measure writers never consulted with them before penning the policy.
“We do have a serious problem with sexual violence in Oregon. One in six Oregon women will be the victim of forceful rape in her lifetime,” says Kerry Naughton, crime survivors program director at the Partnership for Safety and Justice, which has put $16,000 into stopping the measure. Naughton didn’t hear about the measure until it was already approved for the ballot and says it will directly hurt women and children trying to flee domestic violence; in 2009, there were more than 19,500 requests for shelter that couldn’t be met because of a lack of funds.
Rebecca Nickels, executive director of the Portland Women’s Crisis Line says if her group had been consulted about a measure to reduce sex crime in Oregon, it would have written exactly the opposite of Measure 73: Paying for prevention and services, not putting more people behind bars. Her group checks in with eight Portland-area shelters five times a day, but still has to tell 60 percent of clients that none of the region’s 100 shelter beds are open.
“Sometimes we have to get really creative, saying, ‘Can you go to the airport?,’ ‘Can you go to an emergency room, a coffee shop, or even ride the MAX?'” says Nickels. Measure 73, meanwhile, will create 400 to 600 state-funded beds… in prison. For convicts.
Terrie Quinteros, executive director of the Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence, notes that prison time is not very helpful in solving domestic violence because many victims do not report or prosecute their attackers.
“Whether or not they decide to pursue legally, there needs to be services in place for them,” says Quinteros.
The state’s largest union of prison guards also opposes the measure. The Oregon chapter of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) represents over 1,500 corrections officers at 11 of the state’s 14 prisons, and views the measure as an unfunded mandate that will lead to more overcrowding.
“Our members spoke up and said, ‘This is bad.’ We don’t need more inmates. We’re going to have to do more work with less resources,” says AFSCME political director Joe Baessler.
Measure writer Mannix says the idea that crime victims are against Measure 73 is “bogus.”
“You’re talking to the author of the victims’ rights amendment to the Oregon Constitution,” says Mannix, who says he consulted on the measure with district attorneys, police chiefs, sheriffs, and individual victims. Mannix argues that legislators can allocate more money to public safety to make up for the higher prison costs.
“We will be arguing for more money for victims, we refuse to let the legislators stick their heads in the sand and say this is a zero sum game,” says Mannix. The Oregon state budget is facing a likely $3.2 billion shortfall in the next two-year budget cycle, when the measure will cost the justice and human services budget an estimated $12.8 million to $16 million.
One victims group does support the measure: Mothers Against Drunk Driving. Mannix says the groups opposing the measure don’t understand the issue. “To characterize them as crime victims rights groups, they haven’t done a darn thing to protect people from victimization,” says Mannix.
Young women and children have always been protected by wealthy men, but not for the reasons you think. Do you really want to know where the 100 missing children from Oregon and Washington went? And maybe that’s why selfish women and rich men have declared a ‘war on men’ who aren’t worth a cool million.
For centuries they used war to get rid of men, who are stronger and more aggressive than women, and who pose the greatest threat to the ruling elite. Then they used marijuana, since until recently 80% of pot smokers have been men. And today, ‘Hermann’s Monsters’ and the other Oregon predatory prosecutors use sex to get rid of men who are worth less than a million bucks. That’s the real reason why Oregon police and prosecutors do credit checks on any one they investigate. They say it’s to determine if the person is a flight risk. But it’s really to find out if they might get sued for false imprisonment, or worse- And who do the public pretenders really work for?
Just the allegation of sex abuse means any man accused will be secretly indicted and held with excessive bail until they agree to sign a plea bargain, and become a sex offender for life! the secret Grand Jury allows the DDA’s and their hand picked witnesses to lie with impunity, as long as they help the prosecutor get the “bad guy”…
And it don’t matter how many polygraphs they pass ($200 each) and repeatedly say “that’s not what happened”, they are screwed for life. No forgiveness, innocent or not. The authoritarian thugs, who are invested in the private prison complex and the vindictive, phony-feminists have joined forces to destroy as many ‘straight men’ as possible-
And you ladies wonder why men feel they have no choice today other than to pick up a gun to get justice in America. One has to wonder how many of these recent murder-suicides occurred shortly after the woman made some comment about filing a sexual abuse charge. Woman who lie, or who manipulate their children to lie, get nothing, while most regular guys perceive that if they are ever accused of a sex related crime they know they will never get justice in Oregon. Be sure, passing Measure 73 will insure that more domestic disputes will end in violence-
That comment may be the craziest thing I’ve ever seen posted here.
Yep, that is a crazy post, and Kevin Mannix seems to have lost it as well. Saying people who help women and children get out of dangerous, life threatening situations “haven’t done a darn thing to protect people from victimization” is at least incredibly ignorant if not crazy.
Thanks to several decades of corporate media hyping of Jon Benet and Elizabeth Smart, as well as tv crime dramas that have daily sex offender reruns, Nancy Grace and Oprah… sex offenders are right up there with terrorists on the fear scale, and considered even worse than murderers.
And so it shouldn’t be surprising that a majority of people, when asked “Do you want even harsher punishment for sex offenders?” are automatically going to say “Why yes, of course!” without bothering to look at the details or the impact of the specific proposal. It’s a gut reaction, which is why politicians from both parties also use it for easy brownie points.
That’s not to say there’s no reason to take the crime very seriously, but the person interviewed is very correct that prevention is where the focus really needs to be. Harsher punishment doesn’t change a person’s sexual ways. Harsher punishment doesn’t prevent the act. And most importantly, harsher punishment doesn’t do squat to help the person who’s already been violated. Prevention is what matters most.
Until our views as a society are no longer decided by what scandalous topics are most profitable for media to obsess over and make a buck from, our votes will continue to be swayed more by drama than reason or logic.
People are dumb sheep – easily frightened & manipulated.