24/7 Sobriety and HOPE: Creative Ways to Address Substance Use and Alcohol Abuse

From Heritage Foundation, August 21, 2014

State officials in South Dakota and Hawaii have found a creative way to address alcohol use, drug use, and crime. The South Dakota 24/7 Sobriety program and Hawaii’s Opportunity Probation with Enforcement (HOPE) project combine an old criminological theory with modern technology.

Believing that certainty and celerity in punishment are more important than severity and using a rigorous alcohol-testing regimen, South Dakota has made strides toward the reduction of problem drinking.

Hawaii has independently developed and followed a similar approach to the use of drugs and crime, subjecting particular offenders to frequent but random drug urinalysis punished by the certain imposition of a modest stint in jail for those who fail those tests.

Both programs have proved successful and cost-effective. These two programs achieve three elusive goals in criminal justice system reform: reduce substance use, reduce criminal recidivism and reduce incarceration. This model has wide applicability within community corrections. Those creative approaches deserve serious consideration as effective and humane ways to address the grim problems that alcohol- and drug-abusers pose for themselves, victims, and society.

The founders of those programs, along with one of the nation’s preeminent figures in addiction treatment, will discuss the effectiveness of 24/7 Sobriety and HOPE.

More About the Speakers

• The Honorable Larry Long, Circuit Judge, Second Judicial Circuit, South Dakota, and Founder of 24/7 Sobriety
• The Honorable Steven S. Alm, Circuit Judge, Honolulu, Hawaii, and Founder of Hawaii’s Opportunity Probation with Enforcement
• Robert L. DuPont, M.D.Former Director, National Institute for Drug Abuse; Founding President, Institute for Behavior and Health, Inc.; and Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Georgetown University School of Medicine
• Hosted By Paul Larkin, Senior Legal Research Fellow, Heritage Foundation

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ET: Reforming Drug, Alcohol Offenders: 2 Promising Programs

Background: Judge Steven Alm: Justice Reinvestment and the future of HOPE Probation