CA politicians still won't blame skyrocketing retail theft on Prop 47’s gift to criminals—a jail-free shopping spree
In 2022, Santa Clara County’s retail theft shot up by 14% from 2019, nothing compared to San Mateo’s whopping 53% increase. Now forced by public pressure to pay “intense attention” to the problem, Retail Theft Committee Chair Rick Chavez Zbur (D-Hollywood) refuses to blame CA’s Prop 47, the state’s all-you-can-shoplift-up-to-$950 misdemeanor buffet. This fall, however, voters might take a bite out of the pro-crime policy. Clara Harter of The Press-Enterprise reports.
Statewide, reports of shoplifting rose around 30% between 2019 and 2022 and commercial burglary rates were up in 14 of the state’s 15 most populous counties.
Compounding public pressure for legislative action, signatures were recently submitted for a state ballot measure that would overturn key parts of Prop. 47 and reinstate harsher penalties for shoplifting and drug possession.
Prop. 47 was passed by voters in 2014 and made the theft of $950 or less in goods a misdemeanor. The goal was to decrease incarceration rates and direct offenders into rehabilitative programs. But since then many people have soured on the bill and believe it’s to blame for the rise in retail crime.
While many Republican legislators have long called for repealing the measure, many Democratic lawmakers would prefer to create new ways to tackle theft without repealing Prop. 47 wholesale.
“People basically say ‘all of this has happened because of Prop. 47, and their focus is on repealing Prop. 47 rather than actually thinking about what is it that we really need to do in order to stop the problem,” said Zbur. “I’ve never thought that the issue was Prop 47. I think what the data shows us that the issue is we have impediments to law enforcement doing their job.”
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