By Errol Louis NY Daily News
Thursday, January 8th 2009, 4:00 AM
Gov. Paterson's promise Wednesday in his State of the State speech to overhaul New York's harsh, ineffective and costly Rockefeller drug laws represents a step in the right direction. With the state facing a $2 billion deficit, it's fiscally foolish to slap nonviolent, first-time drug offenders with 15-year mandatory minimum sentences, as required under the Rockefeller laws.
It's also cruel.
According to federal statistics, keeping a man behind bars in New York cost taxpayers $36,835 a year in 2006, meaning we're spending more than half a million dollars to lock up a single offender sentenced under Rockefeller.
We'd save billions by spending a fraction of that amount on sensible, proven, preventive measures like drug treatment, mentoring, job training and dropout prevention classes.
But Paterson shouldn't stop with Rockefeller: A significant part of the $2.4 billion corrections budget should be reallocated from incarceration to prevention. More than one inner-city New York neighborhood has so-called million-dollar blocks, places where the state and city are spending at least $1 million to imprison a handful of lawbreakers.
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