Gov. Chris Gregoire is testifying to the House Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness Committee now about the Maurice Clemmons case. She said based on that case — and previous studies of the criminal justice and mental health systems — she has a number of policies she’d like changed. One: Guilty and Mentally Ill conviction, which sends mentally ill criminals into the prison system to receive mental health care.

You can read all about those here or watch live now.

Tags: Gregoire, Maurice Clemmons, public safety

Today:

- Gov. Chris Gregoire discussed a package of bills to increase public safety, including one to create a “guilty and mentally ill” conviction.

- Chief economic forecaster Arun Raha told me the state’s out of a recession, and that the next forecast could bring cheers (possibly a joke).

- People all over the world watched a two-hour hearing on decriminalizing and legalizing marijuana.

- The Senate Early Learning Committee heard about how closing the $2.6 billion budget gap can have a negative or positive effect on the 2011-2013 budget — depending on what money is used.

- The House Ways & Means Committee heard testimony from UW, WSU and other universities about the impact of the Book 1 budget. If it passed, more than 1,000 of the 4,000 students at WSU receiving a state need grant would see that help disappear. The remaining 3,000 would see their grant cut in half.

- The state paid out a record $3.97 billion in unemployment claims in 2009. The county that got the biggest chunk of money? King County — their population of more than 121,000 unemployed received $1.1 billion in benefits.

Tags: Day 3, public safety, Revenue forecast, review, state need grant, unemployment

Gov. Chris Gregoire, in her press conference for bills to address public safety, got a number of questions about legalizing marijuana.

One TV reporter asked if she’d be willing to sign a bill to legalize marijuana if it generated “a billion dollars of revenue” to address the budget shortfall.

“I don’t know how you generate any money when it’s illegal under federal law,” Gregoire said.

When asked if her bill to create a “guilty and mentally ill” conviction would shift costs, she said she’s put money in her budget to address increased mental health costs.

“There’s no one who knows better than I how tough the economic times are that we’re in. But you don’t compromise public safety in tough economic times,” she said. “I’m prepared to pay for it, even in tough economic times. I’d rather do that than have the tragedies we’ve had in the past two months.”

Tags: Gregoire, public safety

Gov. Chris Gregoire’s office just sent out a release about her package of public safety bills — she talked about the bills in her State of the State speech yesterday, but no details were available.

The plan: Create a “guilty and mentally ill” verdict. “This option would allow courts to find a person guilty of a crime and sentence them to prison, instead of a state psychiatric hospital. ‘The rights of dangerous mentally ill offenders can’t trump the safety of our families,’ Gregoire said in the release.

What’s the difference? Currently, if someone is found not guilty by reason of insanity, they are sent into a state psychiatric hospital. After they’ve received sufficient treatment (as deemed by the state), they are released. This new classification would send those mentally ill convicts to prison, where they would receive mental health treatment.

Frontline has a comprehensive explanation of such classifications here. They say that by 2000, at least 20 states had enacted “guilty and mentally ill” laws.

In addition to that, Gregoire is proposing a new Safety Review Panel — that group would review the release of those already convicted not guilty by reason of insanity with “an eye toward protecting our community.”

Gregoire’s other public safety initiatives are after the jump: (more…)

Tags: Gregoire, guilty and mentally ill, public safety

Gregoire was asked if she had any specifics on reform that would address the multiple attacks on police officers here over the last few months.

“There are actually two fronts here. One is in the mental health arena,” she said. She’s got a report on the mental health system, and she says the needs of the public aren’t being met by that system.

The second front is public safety. She said she’s meeting with the law enforcement community today and will have more of their feedback then. But, she said, she knows the Interstate Compact needs to be fixed: “You don’t wash your hands of an inmate of yours in another state,” she said. “I’ll also be looking at criteria by which we in this state … will live in order for us to be willing to take anybody from another state.”

Tags: Gregoire, public safety