Philp: For Newsom, it’s as if California voters never passed Prop. 36

It is as if Proposition 36, the sentencing reform initiative overwhelmingly approved by voters in November, never happened.

Gov. Gavin Newsom’s latest budget proposal continues to ignore Prop. 36’s call for expanded drug treatment opportunities for repeat drug users who seek to end their addiction as an alternative to a stiffer jail or prison sentence.

It appears that California’s leading Democrats prefer to perpetuate the dependency on deadly drugs than to comply with an initiative that they opposed.

“The Governor’s budget not only fails to add dedicated funding for Proposition 36—it actually cuts funds currently being used to implement it,” said Steve Jackson, president of the Chief Probation Officers of California. “This forces counties to do more with less, undermining public safety and making it harder for people to access the accountable drug treatment voters overwhelmingly supported.”

Passed by more than 68% of voters, Prop. 36 increased the punishment for two high-profile offenses, repeat petty thefts and repeat use of hard drugs such as cocaine, fentanyl, heroin, and methamphetamines.

As an alternative to a longer stay in jail or prison, Prop. 36 “will provide drug and mental health treatment.”

It is Prop. 36’s threat of greater jail or prison sentences, which leading Democrats compared to a return to the “war on drugs” era that emphasized the criminalization of drug use. Newsom called Prop. 36 a “drug policy reform that takes us back decades.”

Opponents also pointed to the lack of sufficient drug treatment programs to handle a surge in caseloads.

Yet proponents said the threat of greater punishment was a needed incentive to steer users into treatment. And voters, fed up with images of store looting and open-street drug use, were clearly willing to try Prop. 36 over an unacceptable status quo.

It didn’t help that Prop. 36 didn’t specify precisely where the money would come from to expand treatment programs.

But it was perfectly legal for the initiative to leave that matter to the governor and the Legislature. Yet so far, the governor and the Legislature are punting.

“Probation departments remain committed to meaningful change, but we need the state to stop cutting essential funding and start investing in the outcomes Californians expect and communities deserve,” Jackson said.

Granted, the state budget is under stress.

Newsom is blaming President Donald Trump and his international tariff strategy for costing the state $16 billion in lost tax revenues. But there isn’t even the slightest of efforts to respect the will of the voters when it comes to Prop. 36.

It’s a strange political place for Democrats to be against additional drug treatment as a tool to combat addiction. Breaking the cycle of dependency is one of the most humane things a society can do.

Yet it appears that the intentional starvation of local treatment programs is a means of limiting the implementation of this initiative. No drug user can face a stiffer sentence if treatment isn’t an alternative.

Yet who wins here?

This issue isn’t going away.

A failure to implement Prop. 36 will invite lawsuits from drug users and district attorneys demanding the drug treatment that the initiative requires. But such a court process would take time. And with Newsom set to leave in less than 19 months, it would be the next governor’s problem.

Honoring the rule of law doesn’t allow any party to select which laws are to be followed and which to be ignored. Newsom may not like Prop. 36, but that shouldn’t matter.Apparently, it does.

Tom Philp is a columnist at The Sacramento Bee. ©2025 The Sacramento Bee. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency.