People are being arrested and sent to jail for being addicts and are not receiving support for drug addiction while incarcerated, They are using drugs in jail and go right back into our community without the proper resources to stay sober. I want to start a petition to try and change the State Law in Massachusetts so a person arrested for minor drug possession will be sent to a Rehab/Detox facility where they can recieve the proper support of drug & alcohol recovery professionals and not be sent to a county jail. Drug addiction is classified as a disease by the American Medical Association so why do we still send addicts to jail? They should be sent to a medical facility to recieve drug & alcohol recovery support.

You might say "Well my local county jail has a detox program inside the jail" at the end of the day it is still jail. Same environment, same setting, same atmosphere. I have seen the inside of a county jail detox unit & most of them don't work. They are the same as the rest of the jail.

We need to start teaching people how to live without drugs, especially the young people. We have already lost a whole generation.