TIME FOR REAL REFORM

Gov. Pataki's Plan for Drug Law Overhaul is a Start, But It Doesn't Go Far
Enough

The 30th year of the Rockefeller drug laws came with Gov. Pataki saying
that it was time to end the political posturing and actually enact some reform.

Really, would anyone disagree? Anyone other than the state's rather
well-organized prosecutors, that is?

The more urgent question is who's engaging in posturing now?

Who's responsible for keeping these laws on the books? (Hint: Multiple
answers are allowed, and encouraged.)

Mr. Pataki has another plan for reform, and one that would be immeasurably
better than the inflexible, almost inhumane laws that still leave the wrong
people locked up for far too long. But it doesn't go quite as far as it
might. It would remain up to prosecutors, rather than judges, to determine
which drug offenders are eligible for treatment as opposed to
incarceration. True, there also would be a process where prosecutors'
decisions could be appealed to a judge. But why not give judges the
discretion they should have at the outset?

Worse is the fact that, under the governor's proposal, only people with a
clean record, or at most one felony conviction, would be eligible for the
more lenient and more sensible option of drug treatment. The sad but harsh
reality is that most drug-addicted felons have more than one such
conviction. The cycle of drugs and crime is a brutal one. Ending it, or
trying to, is what an even more enlightened approach to changing the laws
of the Rockefeller era is about.

Look at the numbers. About 1,600 people sent away on drug charges in 2000
were first-time offenders and thus might have been put into the
rehabilitation programs that Mr. Pataki favors. Another 1,752 drug
criminals, however, were repeat offenders. They wouldn't have been eligible
for treatment. At that point, this seems like more halfway reform than
genuine reform.

The governor's plan also is quite unyielding when it comes to dealing with
addicts who suffer relapses. One slip, and back to court on the criminal
charges that were suspended in favor of treatment. That may play well as a
sound bite of the tough but fair variety, but again the truth is
unrelenting. Many addicts do have relapses during treatment. Yet they're
generally the ones most in need of such help. Does that make them more
deserving of excessively long prison sentences?

What all this means is that still more compromise is needed between the two
forces that must reach an agreement for anything to change at all -- the
governor and the Democrats who control the state Assembly. It requires
shedding whatever fears that might persist about appearing soft on crime,
especially in an election year. It requires movement and commitment, rather
than finger-pointing.

Fixing the drug laws isn't exactly hard. It's really no more complicated
than, say, all but eliminating parole or reinstating the death penalty.
Both, of course, have been done under this governor, and with the necessary
support of the Legislature. All it takes is the will.

Let's hear next what the Assembly has to offer to this year's version of
the last-minute push for reform.