ALBANY — Gov. Andrew Cuomo will hold a public hearing with district attorneys, law enforcement officials and advocates ahead of possibly making changes to the controversial new bail reform law, he announced Friday.
“I’m gonna have a meeting. I’m bringing them all up to Albany: the DAs, the police, the advocates from all across the state,” Cuomo said Friday on Long Island Radio.
“We’ll have a public discussion, everybody can state their opinion — the pros, the cons, the fears, anxieties. Let’s hear everybody out.”
His office did not have any details regarding when the meeting would take place.
“But then we have to make the changes and we have to get it done in the budget,” he added of the new law that wiped out cash bail for misdemeanors and most “non-violent” felonies.
While he’s on the same page with state Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart Cousins (D-Westchester), who agrees the state budget — New York’s $178 billion fiscal document due April 1 — is the right place to make fixes to the bail law, it will take some convincing for Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx).
Heastie has insisted he won’t support any changes to the law without seeing “facts and data” first, but told reporters Thursday he’s in the “listening stage” and has invited DAs to “give me statistics on what’s working.”
Stewart Cousins and Cuomo have said they support amendments including total elimination of cash bail, and restoring some discretion to judges should they choose to hold dangerous defendants ahead of trial.
Cuomo also acknowledged Friday the pressure lawmakers are feeling, especially those in rural or suburban areas, as Republicans and progressives alike are threatening primary challenges ahead of the fall election — depending on what side individual pols take.
“Politicians, they are running for re-election. They don’t want to take a position, they’re afraid. They don’t want anyone to protest them,” the third-term Democratic governor added.
Recent poll numbers also show the public is souring on the law, with 59 percent of eligible voters saying the change was a bad idea.
