Walker Signs Anti-Heroin Bills Into Law

A package of anti-heroin bills signed by Gov. Scott Walker on Monday is being praised by both state pharmacists and prison reform advocates.

Together, the seven bills funnel more money into heroin addiction treatment and impose new rules for obtaining narcotics by prescription. Anna Legreid Dopp, who heads the Pharmacy Society of Wisconsin, says the package also creates a new drug disposal program that will reduce the opportunity for addicts to feed their habit with drugs they steal from friends or relatives.

“We know that over 70 percent of people who abuse and misuse prescription drugs will obtain, purchase or steal them from their friends and family members,” she said. “So the public, everyone, can play a role in reducing the availability of these medications before they fall into the wrong hands.”

Prison reform advocate and ex-offender Caliph Muab’El works with WISDOM, a statewide coalition that has the goal of cutting the state prison population in half. He welcomes the part of the package that adds $1.5 million for treatment alternatives and diversion program. He says that could easily result in a thousand fewer people going to prison.

“We’re just happy that people are starting to think along these lines, as opposed to the tough-on-crime rhetoric and ‘Keep ’em locked up as long as possible and throw away the key,’ type rhetoric,” said Muab’El. “So just to see the shift in people’s thought process is a little progress.”

The new treatment funding will go mainly to rural counties that don’t already have such programs. Reform advocates hope the next step will be to tackle the racial disparity in Wisconsin prisons by boosting support to existing diversion programs that serve offenders in urban counties where drug crimes are the most prevalent.