Well, this explains it.
As we covered last week, Bill Montgomery, Maricopa County Attorney, has spoken out vehemently against Prop 205, which would make recreational marijuana use legal in Arizona.
Now we know why he's so against it: if marijuana's legal, his office loses millions of dollars. From The Arizona Republic:
The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office stands to lose millions in drug-diversion program revenue over the next few years should recreational marijuana become legal through Proposition 205.
The funds constitute a small percentage of the county attorney's nearly $100 million annual budget. But over the past 10 years, the office has collected nearly $15 million by referring clients to TASC, a private drug-treatment contractor hired to rehabilitate marijuana and other drug offenders.
If the ballot measure passes, certain marijuana prosecutions would become history, cutting into a drug-diversion program for marijuana offenders that has served almost 15,000 defendants over the past six years.
How exactly does the office profit off of the program?
Defendants facing drug charges must pay the program’s fees, and in exchange they sidestep felony convictions if they successfully complete the program. TASC, in turn, reimburses the County Attorney’s Office up to $650 per marijuana client. […]
The defendant facing marijuana charges is responsible for paying the program fees, which can amount to more than $1,000, according to information obtained by The Republic from TASC. Of this, $150 is marked for intake, another $150 is for program costs, and $650 is then returned to the County Attorney’s Office. Defendants can pay lower fees, based on their income.
Random drug tests required by the program cost $14 apiece, and defendants could be responsible for a $50 fee to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office for fingerprints and photographs. [...]
The office receives $1,200 per defendant arrested on dangerous-drug charges and $1,500 per defendant placed in the TASC program for narcotics, according to a county attorney's spokeswoman.
Not only do private rehabilitation centers make money when low level users are arrested, but Montgomery's office does too. Low-level marijuana users, meanwhile, get charged. And unsurprisingly, those taxpayers are disproportionately black and brown.
Montgomery has denied that his office is opposed to Prop 205 because of the potential monetary loss. "I’m not in this in order to try to drive up any monies that people would have to pay for fines and fees," said Montgomery, according to The Republic.
But he can't deny that his office profits off of the program, and Montgomery's political opposition seems to be pretty clearly a conflict of interest.
“It’s disgusting,” said J.P. Holyoak, chair of the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol. “The idea that the county attorney, his office has a financial incentive to keep prohibition in place … it may not be illegal, but it is absolutely corrupt.”