Staying sober in San Francisco will soon be all about the Benjamins.
The city’s board of supervisors on Tuesday unanimously backed what supporters call the “Cash Not Drugs” program, which promises a $100 weekly incentive for select welfare recipients to stay off drugs, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
The program is the latest effort by San Francisco leaders to tackle the city’s ongoing drug crisis, which has already claimed over 500 lives this year, the paper reported.
The plan was introduced over the summer by supervisor Matt Dorsey and embattled mayor London Breed, both Democrats. The incentive will be available to residents who receive public assistance and who are screened for drugs and referred for treatment.
The program will provide “tangible incentives to reinforce positive behaviors like abstinence from addictive substances or adherence to medically-assisted treatment,” Dorsey, a recovering addict, said when introducing the plan in July.
“Cash Not Drugs” comes after San Francisco voters in March overwhelmingly backed Proposition F, a ballot initiative that mandates that anyone receiving public-assistance benefits be screened for a substance-abuse disorder.
As part of the initiative, welfare recipients found to be drug-dependent could be offered treatment. If it’s made available at no cost, they could be required to participate to continue receiving benefits. Those are the people who would qualify for “Cash Not Drugs.”
The city believes about a third of its welfare recipients have a substance-abuse disorder.
Dorsey told National Review earlier this year that he supports drug screenings for “people who are at wildly disproportionate risk for substance-use disorder, and, because of the era we are in with fentanyl, at wildly disproportionate risk for deadly overdoses.”
Breed, whose sister died of drug overdose, told the Chronicle in a statement that “Cash Not Drugs” is part of a “broad and diverse approach to getting people into treatment and care.”
“While enforcement and accountability are part of the solution to our drug crisis, we also need programs like this that offer incentives for people to seek help and sobriety,” she said.
During Breed’s first term as mayor, San Francisco struggled through a drug-abuse epidemic, a surge in homelessness, rampant retail theft, the shuttering of many downtown businesses, and a struggling economy. She is vulnerable during next week’s election.
Mark Farrell, the co-founder of a venture capital firm, and Daniel Lurie, an heir to the Levi Strauss fortune, are Breed’s two main threats to her reelection. Both are running as moderate Democrats. Breed, Farrell, and Lurie are all vowing to crack down on crime and homelessness.







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