FACTIONS PREPARETO DEBATE MERITS OF SAFE SCHOOL BILL

Bridgeport NAACP head Carolyn Nah will be front row center in Room 2E
of the Legislative Office Building on Friday for a public hearing on
the so-called safe schools bill.

Chief State's Attorney Christopher Morano will probably be there too,
but he will be well on the other side of the aisle.

Citing a national study by the Justice Policy Institute, state Rep.
Marie Lopez Kirkley-Bey, D-Hartford, is sponsoring a bill that would
reduce the size of the state's drug-free zones from 1,500 to 200 feet.

In the early 1990s, the Legislature set additional penalties for
those who possess and sell drugs within 1,500 feet of a school,
day-care center or housing project. Defendants convicted of doing so
could face an additional three years in prison.

But Kirkley-Bey argues that while that law was well intentioned it
has created a racial disparity resulting in minorities being
incarcerated for more time than whites.

The problem, she said, is that in the cities there are more schools,
day-care centers and housing projects than in rural areas.

"There is no place in the city of Hartford where you don't fall
within the law," she explained.

"So we and other states are looking at these laws and asking if they
are really fair and I don't think they are."

"I am totally in support of this bill," said Nah. "Everyone who
lives in the ghetto lives within 1,500 feet of a housing project or a school."

Morano said the bill is an attempt to do away with mandatory minimum
sentences, which he said have been shown to be effective.

"The name 'Safe Schools' is extremely misleading because it can be
argued that pushing the perimeter back to 200 feet is less
protection," he said. "It's not about safe schools; in fact, it would
increase the potential for the opposite to occur."

He continued: "Proponents of the bill also argue that the minimum
mandatory sentence should only apply to drug activity that occurs
when school is open but that logic doesn't fly because of the
residual effects of drug dealing. And often schools are used for
community activities after school hours."

Bridgeport Public Defender Joseph Bruckmann said the people he has
represented who faced these sentencing enhancements were neither
using narcotics in the presence of school-age children nor selling
them to any school-age children.

"So in that regard, that which was intended to protect children may
not be having its intended effect," he said.

"As a general rule, people either possessing or selling narcotics are
not planning on getting caught, and they engage in their illegal
behavior while well aware that it is a violation of the law to do so
anywhere in their city or town. In the same way that it would be nave
to say that our state and federal drug laws have made the entire
state of Connecticut a 'drug-free' zone, I think it is a fiction to
believe that these 1,500-foot-radius zones have any deterrent effect
on these activities. The only likely practical effect is the
potentially greater punishment available against those who commit
these crimes and happen to live in or near these targeted areas."

The Legislature's Judiciary Committee will conduct a public hearing
on the Safe Schools bill at 1 p.m. in Room 2E of the Legislative
Office Building in Hartford.