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Raquel Cagan: Foote will increase diversion and prioritize treatment over jail time

Last Saturday, I had the opportunity to attend a gathering thrown by a neighbor of mine supporting Mike Foote’s candidacy for District Attorney.
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This content was originally published by the Longmont Observer and is licensed under a Creative Commons license.

Last Saturday, I had the opportunity to attend a gathering thrown by a neighbor of mine supporting Mike Foote’s candidacy for District Attorney.

I came away incredibly impressed with Mike’s passion for our community, his understanding of the issues Boulder County faces, and his vision for how the District Attorney’s office can address those issues. One meeting was all it took for me to become a strong supporter.

In particular, I was impressed with Mike’s vision for diversion and restorative justice programs which is an issue I’ve spent much of my professional life advocating for the youth I work with. More recently, I requested possibly the first such intervention for an adult offender when my home was broken into and prescribed Schedule II drugs were stolen.

Instead of pressing charges, I chose a restorative justice program which allowed the perpetrator to meet with me and representatives from both law enforcement and the community to hear about how that offense impacted everyone involved. It also provided for an appropriate intervention as well as monitoring. This kept the individual from weighing down the criminal justice system and the District Attorney’s office, allowing them to focus on more serious offenses like violent crime. Mike Foote will expand these programs.

At this event, Foote laid out his vision for a District Attorney’s office that prioritizes “treatment, not jail,” as he put it, and keeps people out of the criminal justice system who don’t need to be there by increasing diversion and restorative justice programs like the one used in my case.

Mike Foote has the kind of forward thinking progressive vision that Boulder County needs in the District Attorney’s office.

Dr. Raquel Cagan

Longmont Co 80503

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