http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/09/20/BAT519OMJL.DTL

Audit faults S.F. D.A.'s prostitution program
John Coté, Chronicle Staff Writer

Sunday, September 20, 2009

The program operated by the San Francisco district attorney's office targeting customers of prostitutes has ill-defined goals and no way to determine its effectiveness, according to a new audit by the city's budget analyst.

Despite being touted as a national model that comes at no cost to taxpayers, the audit said the program didn't cover its expenses in each of the last five years, leading to a $270,000 shortfall.

The program has first-time offenders arrested for soliciting a prostitute pay as much as $1,000 for a one-day class taught by sex-trafficking experts, former prostitutes and others in exchange for having the misdemeanor charge dropped. The program was $49,000 in the red last year, the audit said.

District Attorney Kamala Harris' office disputes that the program is ineffective and says the 14-year-old First Offender Prostitution Program, begun eight years before she was elected district attorney, paid for itself during its first nine years and will do so again.

"There have been a few years in which the revenue generated has not exceeded expenditures," said Erica Derryck, a spokeswoman for Harris. "We're actively implementing cost controls to prevent this from being an ongoing pattern."

Those steps include using on-duty police officers rather than paying overtime for the eight undercover prostitution stings a month that the program covers, authorities said.

The audit was requested last year by then-Supervisor Jake McGoldrick before an ultimately unsuccessful ballot measure to decriminalize prostitution in the city.

Budget Analyst Harvey Rose's audit said the program is not "sufficiently comprehensive" to be "effective in reducing recidivism or assisting women to leave prostitution."

Harris' staff disputes that, noting that the program has been replicated in 37 other locations nationwide.

Prosecutors also point to a 2008 report commissioned by the National Institute of Justice that found men who attended San Francisco's so-called "john school" were about 30 percent less likely to reoffend.

But even researchers in that two-year study said the reports' findings were unexpected.

"While the program has a sensible curriculum and was generally well executed ... (its) low-intensity and brief intervention, which lacks aftercare, led us not to expect a statistically significant impact," the report said.

The budget analyst says the program has no clearly defined goal. Various documents say the program reduces the demand for prostitution through education, reduces recidivism and assists women in leaving prostitution, according to the audit.

But the district attorney's office doesn't have the resources to measure recidivism, including if the person reoffends in another county, and the nonprofit group that provides social services to prostitutes does not track the number of women who left the profession, the audit says.

Paul Henderson, chief of administration for the district attorney, said even if auditors were unsure, the program's goal was clear: cut reoffending among solicitors of street prostitution in the city.

"The two-year NIJ study shows that the program has been effective," he said.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/09/20/BAT519OMJL.DTL#ixzz0RewTXpLt

Oh please!! Maybe less likely to get caught....of course we are going to "reoffend"!

PZA

"Its NEVER over!"

http://forum.myredbook.com/dcforum2/User_files2/a378f7xvjy365qdy.jpg

http://forum.myredbook.com/dcforum2/User_files2/k914q21ycvpv92i2.jpg

"$49,000 in the red last year"

"There have been a few years in which the revenue generated has not exceeded expenditures," said Erica Derryck, a spokeswoman for Harris. "We're actively implementing cost controls to prevent this from being an ongoing pattern."

Guess what little miss spin doctor? It's already an ongoing pattern.

These people stinking up their offices will continue to lie through their teeth to keep their gravy train rolling. They dispute the findings of an audit and prefer to cite self-serving studies to suit their needs.

As for the "effectiveness" of their scam... err... shakedown... err... "program", I am inclined to go find a SW in SF and to commensurate a business deal in defiance of "john school"... as a former student. They trapped me once, about 15 years ago or so, and the wake up call succeeded in training me to never let my guard down and get caught by these scum-bag extortionists again. I have, of course NOT stopped patronizing the world's oldest profession, on the streets or otherwise. My activities have moved for the most part away from picking up girls off the street, but only because I have had the privilege of enjoying different venues. But I reserve the right to be a street thrill-seeker when I see fit. As I stated, it is my intention to celebrate this fact finding audit by going out and mongering the Streets of San Francisco. FU Harris, Newsome, and Hotaling. You're all whores in the worst sense, and nothing would please me more than to see your retirement plan/scams shrivel up to nothing.

TJWrong

So the program is based on stings to bring in business.
About a hundred stings a year.
A hundred instances of initiating multiple acts of prostitution in SFO. Possibly 1,000 or 2,000 separate acts of police-created prostitution.
WTF is the point, other than to feed the stupid program.?

http://www.sfgov.org/site/budanalyst_index.asp?id=4425

I hope someone(s) can shed some light on this for the rest of us. I am not so good at finding the goodies in government reports