Supervisor Antonovich Questions Recent USC/Los Angeles Times Poll

Posted by: KHTS FM 98.1 & AM 1220 in Santa Clarita News June 12, 2013 - 12:32 pm 0 112 Views

County Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich has dismissed the findings of a USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times Survey.

Don’t miss a thing. Get breaking Santa Clarita news alerts delivered right to your inbox.

The results of the survey inferred that 74 percent of California voters would support keeping offenders in county custody rather than sending them to state prisons.

“This is a ‘push poll’ that seeks to manipulate public opinion rather than measure it,” Antonovich said.

Antonovich claimed that the poll was misleading in several ways.

The poll failed to mention that of the 11,122 offenders, more than 6,000 were re-arrested, according to a news release from Antonovich’s office.

More than 4,000 of those arrests were for new offenses, which are now awaiting decision by the district attorney.

The poll also fails to mention that criminals that are classified as “low-level,” are classified by their most recent crime, not their most severe.

The poll does not mention that California could reduce costs by sending criminals to other states to serve their sentence. In turn, this would lower crime rates as “low-level” criminals tend to escalate their crimes.

The poll uses complex statements that require the respondent to notice one premise which contradicts the conclusion, according to the news release.

Most importantly, the poll failed to mention the biggest issue – increased crime rate.

A quadruple murder last fall in Northridge, a woman set on fire at a bus stop in Van Nuys and a 10-year-old Northridge girl abducted and sexually assaulted in March are a few examples of the public safety issues created by realignment, the news release said.

“The Governor and other realignment advocates ignore the crime statistics and human toll and doggedly defend pseudo cost savings associated with shifting these major programs to local governments,” Antonovich said. “The fact is that true cost saving lies with contracting for detention space–which the Governor has ruled out for political reasons–and keeping crime rates low by having criminals serve their full sentences.”

Do you have a news tip? Call us at (661) 298-1220, or drop us a line at community@hometownstation.com.