CA News
After 35 years, it looks as if New York is finally ready to Drop the Rock.
February 2009
For the first time since the Rockefeller Drug Laws were enacted over 35 years ago, the State's three most important political leaders—the Governor, the Assembly Speaker, and the Senate Majority Leader—are actively pressing for serious drug law reform.
With our state facing huge budget shortfalls, policymakers must find pragmatic ways to produce government savings without cutting popular and needed services in areas of health, education, and housing. Sweeping changes to these wasteful, ineffective, and racially biased statutes would result in diverting thousands of low-level drug offenders from prison to alternatives to incarceration and drug treatment programs each year-and produce annual savings of hundreds of millions of dollars for the state.
Our allies in Albany tell us that key policymakers are gearing up to draft new legislation on these harsh laws.
While it is tempting to celebrate now, we have much hard work ahead of us.
In the coming weeks and months, we will closely monitor this rapidly evolving process to make certain it fully represents the change and quality of justice we seek. We will keep the pressure on the Legislature and Governor Paterson to ensure that any new legislation drafted includes sentencing discretion for judges in all drug cases.
We believe that the people and communities most directly affected by the Rockefeller Drug Laws must be involved in this debate-potentially the most important criminal justice policy development in New York for decades. On March 10, we will bring hundreds of members of our Drop the Rock Coalition— formerly incarcerated people, service providers, family members of people in prison, and other concerned New Yorkers—to Albany to make their voices heard and to advocate for the repeal of the laws.
Learn More & Get Involved
- Sign up for our e-newlsetter—we will keep you updated with breaking information on this issue and our efforts.
- Sign the petition to repeal the Rockefeller Drug Laws. We already have received 25,000 signatures—add your name today!
- For more information on Advocacy Day, please contact Drop the Rock campaign coordinator Caitlin Dunklee, or visit www.droptherock.org.
[Download new Drop the Rock fact sheets] [Read recent press on the issue]