Why Proposition 47 is a success
In his State of the City address in January, San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria said we should “lock up criminals, not laundry detergent.” This overly heartless statement was intended to discredit Proposition 47, which passed in 2014 with the support of 55 percent of San Diego voters. Ironically, in the same speech, Gloria proudly called San Diego “one of the safest big cities in America.” Two months later, he praised San Diego’s two-year downward trend in crime rates.
Mayor Gloria should give credit where credit is due. In the decade since its passage, Proposition 47, also known as the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Act, has brought social and financial transformation to our region and our state. The truth is, Proposition 47 is a victory for all Californians.
Voters passed Proposition 47 shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled to order California to reduce its prison population due to violations of the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause of the Eighth Amendment. Before Proposition 47, California’s prisons were nearly twice as full. By reclassifying low-level, nonviolent offenses such as drug and property crimes from felonies to misdemeanors, Proposition 47 has helped reduce overcrowding and bring the state into compliance with constitutional standards. This is a significant social advancement, as the U.S. has the highest incarceration rate in the world, and San Diego County’s incarceration rate, while not the highest in California, is higher than the world average and that of most major international cities.
Proposition 47 is both a public safety measure and a law reform. This law has made society safer by addressing many of the root causes of involvement in the criminal justice system.
A grant evaluation released in 2024 found that in addition to a significant reduction in racial disparities across the criminal justice system, recidivism rates among people who participated in services funded by Proposition 47 grants were “more than twice as low as those for people traditionally incarcerated by the California Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections.” The grant evaluation also found that homelessness decreased by 60 percent and unemployment decreased by 50 percent among people who completed the program.
“These results continue to demonstrate that Proposition 47 is delivering the results voters demanded – safer communities where people who commit minor crimes receive housing, employment, mental health care and drug rehabilitation instead of prison sentences,” said State and Community Corrections Board Chair Linda Penner.. “California should build on this progress and invest in policies that both reduce incarceration rates and improve public safety.”
Calls for increased criminalization stem largely from the fabricated “shoplifting crisis” narrative promoted by Mayor Gloria and other critics of Proposition 47. In fact, numerous reports have debunked claims of rising retail crime. Property crimes, including burglary and robbery, have declined 18 percent in the City of San Diego compared to a three-year average. Shoplifting rates in San Diego County have declined 21 percent from 2019 to 2022. Undoing Proposition 47’s regional and statewide progress based on false narratives would be willfully irresponsible and harmful.
Criminalization is a simplistic and ineffective approach that exacerbates the stresses faced by many San Diegans, including poverty, drug use, and mental health issues, as well as inflation and high costs of living. Rather than addressing these societal problems, criminalization simply masks them and pushes those most affected into a punitive legal system that offers no real solutions, making their problems even more difficult to overcome. Proposition 47, on the other hand, invests in community-based programs that address societal problems directly.
Make no mistake. Proposition 47 is a victory for all Californians. Its progress is worth defending.
Sigua is a senior policy attorney at the ACLU Foundation of San Diego & Imperial Counties and Geneviéve Jones-Wright is executive director of Community Advocates for Just and Moral Governance.
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