HOPE SEEN ON DRUG LAWS

Albany -- Some activists say changes to harsh sentences seem more
likely by next year

This won't be the month -- or the session -- for an agreement on
rewriting New York's stiff drug laws. Yet activists and reform-minded
legislators think they've started talks that could lead to changes.

On Tuesday, Bishop Howard Hubbard lobbied Senate leaders, the latest
of a long line of activists recently trying to get their points across
on the tough drug laws created during the Rockefeller era.

None have gotten past the polite discussion stage, said former state
Sen. John Dunne, here last week.

"There's no movement whatsoever,'' he said. "I think there's a general
perception the public doesn't care much about it. I can't just get
anybody to say, 'This needs to be done.' ''

Assemblymen Joseph Lentol and Jeffrion Aubry, leaders of a
criminal-justice focus group appointed by Speaker Sheldon Silver, said
talks with high-level representatives of Gov. George Pataki and Senate
Republicans occurred during the past week.

However, Aubry said the discussions left him pessimistic about an
agreement in the near term.

The laws, considered the harshest in the nation, require judges to
impose long sentences compared to time given for similar drug offenses
in other states.

Pataki introduced a measure linked to elimination of parole while
Assembly Democrats pushed for judicial discretion. Aubry said the
Senate wants reforms linked to measures on money laundering and
punishments for drug lords.

"I'm not jumping for joy, but we're at a point we've never been
before,'' Aubry said.

"There hasn't been a breakthrough,'' Lentol said. "We'll probably be
revisiting this issue again.''

John M. Kerry, executive director of the Catholic Conference, who
joined Hubbard in the private Senate meeting, said the progress is
being measured in small steps. "Maybe next session,'' he said.

Religious groups and other activists, such as the League of Women
Voters, have been urging legislators to enact alternative sentencing
laws while expanding drug-treatment programs. The mandatory sentences
under the 26-year-old laws in many cases result in nonviolent drug
offenders serving longer prison terms than murderers or rapists.

The Student Association of the State University of New York has also
been campaigning for more lenient sentencing.

As with talks on drug-law reforms, Lentol said negotiations on a
gun-control bill are continuing among legislative leaders and the
governor's office.

But with little time left before the scheduled departure of the
Legislature -- the Senate leaves after today while the Assembly plans
to work a few more days -- a deal may not be reached until later this
year or early next, some legislators say.

Another agreement unlikely to be reached involves campaign-finance
reform. Assembly bills were held in committee Tuesday and a public
financing measure passed earlier is not favored by the Senate.