Top U.S. Black Professionals Hold Public Hearings in Los Angeles Investigating Racial Disparities in Substance Abuse Policies

21 February 2006

Today and yesterday members of a Blue Ribbon Commission convened by the National African American Drug Policy Coalition hold public hearings to investigate and develop recommendations on the racial disparities in substance abuse policies across the nation. The Commission heard testimony from black professionals including judges, medical professionals, social workers, law and criminal justice professionals and others. The information gathered in the hearings will serve to develop a set of recommendations that the Coalition will issue in the spring as part of an initiative to change U. S. drug policies and laws and to advocate for drug policies and laws that take into account drug abuse as a public health issue, among other factors.

Los Angeles area policymakers, clergy, attorneys, and other professionals provided testimony on the extent to which race is a factor in the implementation of alcohol and illegal drugs laws as well as substance abuse prevention and treatment policies. The hearings also dealt with questions of whether substance abuse laws and policies negatively impact the delivery of health, social and legal services for African Americans, and how laws and policies can ensure the availability of quality and equitable substance abuse treatment and prevention to African Americans. Experts detailed multiple instances of inequitable and damaging treatment of African Americans facing drug charges.

"Profoundly documented are the equality gaps that continue to undermine African Americans and their quest for parity in the American mainstream in critical areas of economics, education, health, civil rights and social justice, and civic engagement," said Lee P. Brown, chair of the Commission. "We must shift national attention to focus on the continuing and unacceptable racial disparities that keep African Americans from accessing and using effective preventive health and health treatment services that are so vitally needed."

The Coalition launched the initiative in response to concerns, such as those raised in a recent study conducted by the RAND Drug Policy Research Center that called attention to the fact that disadvantaged racial and ethnic minorities in the U.S. are overrepresented in the criminal justice system, primarily in regard to drug offenses. In its study the RAND Drug Policy Research Center said that the use of incarceration for drug control has had significant effects on the health and well-being of minority communities.

Supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and based at the Howard University School of Law, the NAADPC comprises 23 organizations with a total membership of 255,000. Each Coalition member organization contributes its professional expertise toward eradicating the negative societal effects of drug abuse, particularly in the African American community. The desired outcomes of the Coalition's efforts are to protect the nation's children from drug use, reduce crime, improve public safety and order, enhance public health, and promote the wise and efficient use of scarce public resources.

"This Coalition is the most broad-based group I have ever seen. The recommendations put forth will move drug control policy in a more constructive direction, especially as it relates to people of color," said Kurt L. Schmoke, dean of the Howard Law School and chair of the NAADPC. "A major effort will focus on pretrial diversion and where sentencing is necessary, on therapeutic sentencing where we will educate and train judges to provide sentences to drug offenders that will make them better people coming out of prison than they were going in."

"The professionals who came forward today have our great thanks and respect," said Judge Arthur L. Burnett, national executive director of the NAADPC. "With their thoughtful testimony we will be able to develop far-reaching recommendations that will embrace the public health nature of drug abuse and provide a more effective and humane approach to address the chronic societal problem of drug abuse."

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The National African American Drug Policy Coalition is comprised of pre-eminent African American professional organizations that share a common cause of promoting drug policies and laws that embrace the public health nature of drug abuse and urge a more effective and humane approach to addressing the chronic societal problems associated with drug abuse. The NAADPC receives financial support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

For more information about NAADPC, visit http://www.naadpc.org. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation focuses on the pressing health and health care issues facing our country. As the nation's largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to improving the health and health care of all Americans, the Foundation works with a diverse group of organizations and individuals to identify solutions and achieve comprehensive, meaningful and timely change. For more than 30 years the Foundation has brought experience, commitment, and a rigorous, balanced approach to the problems that affect the health and health care of those it serves. Helping Americans lead healthier lives and get the care they need -- the Foundation expects to make a difference in our lifetime. For more information, visit http://www.rwjf.org.

EDITORS: Public testimony taking place today (Feb. 18), 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at Loyola Law School, Loyola Marymount University, Burns Building, Student Lounge, 919 Albany Street, Los Angeles, CA 90015. The event is open to the media.

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