New Jersey legislative update
Fall 2007
Growing support for sentencing reform in the Garden State
FAMM is busy planting seeds in the Garden State for drug-free zone law reform and expanded access to drug courts for individuals convicted of low-level, nonviolent drug offenses.
Joseph Greer, FAMM’s New Jersey campaign director, and Lynn Nowak, FAMM consultant, are meeting with key legislative and municipal leaders to win support. Greer and Nowak recently met with DeShawn Wright, chief policy advisor to Newark Mayor Cory Booker, to discuss the possible inclusion of the reforms in Booker’s overall strategy to combat crime in the city.
Under the drug-free zone reform, the size of the zones would be reduced from 1,000 feet to 200 feet and the new penalty for drug-free zone violations would become a second degree offense. Drug-free zone reform bills A.2877 sponsored by former Assemblyman Peter J. Barnes (D-18, Middlesex) and S.278 sponsored by Senator Bernard Kenny (D-Hudson) are still pending action, hopefully by the end of the year.
Cultivating the grassroots
FAMM members attended a membership meeting led by Greer in Camden in June. He recently joined a roundtable discussion sponsored by the American
Civil Liberties Union of New Jersey (ACLU-NJ), where more than a half dozen statewide organizations discussed sentencing, police practices, prison conditions, immigration, voting rights and education. FAMM and the ACLU-NJ are working together to educate the community about drug-free zones and
their consequences, such as loss of the right to vote.
For more information on events or to volunteer with New Jersey FAMM, contact Joseph Greer at (609) 577-9520; NJ FAMM, P.O. Box 699, Plainsboro, JJ; 08536; or jgreer@famm.org.