The Michigan House overwhelmingly passed legislation lifting a lifetime ban on food assistance benefits for people with drug felonies.
The legislation passed out of the house on a 92-15 vote and is expected to be signed into law.
Currently, Michigan residents with more than one drug felony conviction cannot receive food assistance benefits.
Alex Rossman is with the Michigan League for Public Policy.
“I really think it’s been a bipartisan mindshift to understand the economic repercussions that a criminal record or previous offenses are having on people and that it really makes it impossible to get out from under the punishment and payment of those mistakes,” he said.
A 2018 study found access to food assistance reduced recidivism within the first year by 13%.
Rossman said the laws were put on the books in an effort to reduce crime by penalizing it. But, he said, drug crimes are often bourne out of economic circumstances or addiction.
“Why don’t we look at how better to treat addiction or how to reduce property instead of putting people away for long periods of time and then giving them criminal records and red tape on assistance that last their lifetime and make it harder to get back on the straight and narrow,” he said.
The Senate Fiscal Agency estimates that in 2019 the state denied roughly two thousand people access to benefits for having more than one felony drug conviction.
Granting those individuals access to benefits would have cost the state nearly $3-million.