Drug law enforcement : a review of the evaluation literature

This article describes the results of a systematic review of drug law enforcement evaluations. The authors describe the search procedures and document the results in five main categories: international/national interventions (e.g., interdiction and drug seizure), reactive/ directed interventions (e.g., crackdowns, raids, buy-busts, saturation patrol, etc.), proactive/ partnership interventions (e.g., third-party policing, problem-oriented policing, community policing, drug nuisance abatement, etc.), individualized interventions (e.g., arrest referral and diversion), or interventions that used a combination of reactive/directed and proactive/ partnership strategies. Results indicate that proactive interventions involving partnerships between the police and third parties and/or community entities appear to be more effective at reducing both drug and nondrug problems in drug problem places than are reactive/ directed approaches. But the general quality of research in drug law enforcement is poor, the range of interventions that have been evaluated is limited, and more high-quality research is needed across a greater variety of drug interventions

Do speed cameras produce net benefits? Evidence from British Columbia, Canada

Traffic collisions kill about 43,000 Americans a year. Worldwide, road traffic injuries are the leading cause of death by injury and the ninth leading cause of all deaths. Photo Radar speed enforcement has been implemented in the United States and many other industrialized countries, yet its cost-effectiveness from a societal viewpoint, taking all significant impacts into account, has not been reported. This paper fills this gap, reporting on a Photo Radar traffic safety program introduced in 1996 in British Columbia, Canada, and incorporating the results of rigorous statistical analyses on speed and crash impacts into a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis from both societal and sponsoring-agency perspectives. The study reveals that the Rhoto Radar Program cost C$27 million per year in 2001 Canadian dollars (?US$21 million) and generated benefits valued at $142 million per year (?US$109 million), for net societal benefits of C$115 million per year (?US$88 million). It was estimated that the sponsoring agency saved C$38 million (?US$29 million) annually in claim costs. These results are robust to plausible alternate assumptions. Societal net benefits become negative only if the reduction in injuries and fatalities is one standard error below the expected value, or if private travel time is valued at or above C$15 per hour. Agency claim cost savings are greater than program costs under all scenarios tested. These results are likely applicable to jurisdictions in developed countries with similar traffic infrastructure: Greater use of highway photo radar speed enforcement would be good public policy. © 2006 by the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management