Understanding Prop 47’s Real Outcomes

Last month, the Public Policy Institute of California released a report, entitled “Proposition 47’s Impact on Racial Disparity in Criminal Justice Outcomes”.

The report examines Proposition 47, “The Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act”, which implemented three broad changes to felony sentencing laws. First, it reclassified certain theft and drug possession offenses from felonies to misdemeanors, including shoplifting, forgery, insufficient funds, petty theft, receiving stolen property, and petty theft with a prior. The proposition also reclassified drug possession under Health and Safety Code sections 11350, 11357(a) , and 11377 as strictly misdemeanors. (As with the aforementioned theft offenses, these new misdemeanor rules do not apply to individuals who one or more prior offenses (specified under Penal Code section 667(e)(2)(C)(iv).)

Second, it authorized defendants (who were at the time serving sentences for previously classified felonies) to petition courts for re-sentencing under the new provisions. Finally, it authorized defendants who have completed their sentences (for what was previously considered a felony offense), to apply to reclassify those convictions to misdemeanors.

The Public Policy Institute argues that Prop. 47 was not racially motivated, but instead passed due to “concerns about the state’s over-reliance on costly incarceration, and by jail and prison capacity issues”. In their report, they look at disparities in arrests and bookings, as well as the implications of those disparities in the criminal justice system.

The report boasts that “arrest and bookings declined notably in the wake of proposition 47”. However, just one paragraph after their key headline, the Institute explains why this is in fact the only logical conclusion that could have come from the proposition, even stating “it is not surprising to see decreases in felony arrests for offenses reclassified as misdemeanors.”  They continue to explain that while “some might have expected to see a corresponding increase in misdemeanor arrests for reclassified offenses[…] the criteria for a misdemeanor arrest are stricter than those for felonies. Moreover, the passage of Prop 47 sent a signal to law enforcement that the reclassified offenses are now deemed less severe, and that officers should be more judicious about making arrests, which use up costly public resources and involve risks to both officers and arrestees.”

Within it’s first few pages, the report’s misleading title begins to unravel itself. It is established that crime rates have not actually decreased as implied, but rather that crime classified as a “felony” has decreased. Moreover, the Institute explains that misdemeanors are less likely to result in arrests than felonies.  In combination, these factors point to merely re-labeling criminal offenses, and law enforcement’s decisions to make less arrests. It is misleading to conclude that the number of incidents have decreased objectively as a result of Prop. 47.

The report then moves on to examine prop 47’s effect on Racial Disparities. It claims that that arrest rate for both drug and property felonies dropped the most for African Americans. (Note that the arrest rate for both drug and property felonies dropped for all races.) There is notable decrease in African-American felonies, although there is also a modest increase in misdemeanor bookings. Furthermore “while the decrease in the monthly African American felony booking rate is roughly double the decrease among white and Latinos, both felony and misdemeanor booking rates remain significantly higher for African Americans.” Although “felonies” have dropped for African-Americans, they have also dropped for white and Latino groups, leaving African-American “misdemeanors” still with significantly higher numbers than compared races.

The racial disparities that the report insinuates were solved by prop 47 are virtually untouched, especially when one recalls that “arrest and booking rates for violent offenses – a crime category not directly affected by the Prop 47 reclassifications – do not change discernibly.”  The “racial disparities in criminal justice outcomes” are a product of a multitude of factors, including offenses that are still classified as violent offenses. The booking rates and arrests for African Americans have not dropped at all as a result of proposition 47, leaving a large category of crime untouched, and maintaining large racial inequity in the criminal justice system.

In fact, the decline in arrest and booking rates was nearly the same percentage for all races measured, dropping 5.5% for latinos, 5.1% for Americans, and 3.7% for whites. The racial disparity remains, leaving African Americans still with a disproportionately higher number of arrests and bookings than Latinos and Whites.

If the aim of proposition 47 was to reduce prison costs and halt overcrowding, it has succeeded. The Institute’s report concludes “Prop 47 quickly and significantly lowered the number of arrests and bookings, and hence reduced pretrial detention in California: the average monthly number of bookings narrowed by 10.4 percent.” However, the implication that this proposition has extended its influence to narrow racial disparities in the criminal justice system is severely misguided. Not only has it maintained the same relative rates of crime between races, but it has failed to reduce crime on an abstract scale, simply re-labeling “felonies” as “misdemeanors”.

Although proposition 47 aims to reduce incarceration costs, with so many crimes seemingly de-criminalized, what cost are citizens now paying for their safety?