ALBANY — Top aides to Speaker Carl Heastie are meeting with panicked rank-and-file Assembly Democrats who are demanding changes to the controversial bail reform law, The Post has learned.
Heastie has publicly been the staunchest advocate of the law, so the closed-door meetings appear to be the speaker’s first admission that eliminating the potential to impose bail on those accused of misdemeanor and some “non-violent” felony crimes has to be revisited — especially following public outcry over the release of dangerous defendants who were then re-arrested and charged with committing more crimes.
Criticism of the law is coming from both upstate and downstate Assembly Democrats, who control the chamber, sources said.
One Assembly member from New York City privately fumed that even liberal Democrats are politically exposed because fellow progressive Democrat, Mayor Bill de Blasio, is also lobbying for changes to the law because he complained it went too far and lets loose dangerous criminals.
“These briefings show that leadership understands this is a very, very big issue and a lot of members are feeling the heat and a lot of members are uncomfortable,” the lawmaker said, adding, “When you have Bill de Blasio not on board, you have a problem.”
During the meetings, Heastie’s staffers are briefing members about the specifics of the new law — rammed through the Legislature and then signed off on by Gov. Andrew Cuomo as part of the state budget 10 months ago — and they’re getting a lot of blowback.
The briefings are also an acknowledgement that many lawmakers don’t know key specifics of the bail reform law they approved last year. The law was tucked into a massive state budget bill to provide members political cover instead of being voted on as a stand-alone bill, which would have invited more scrutiny, Albany sources said.
Even Heastie has been accused of misstating the law in a series of tweets with Post columnist and former Bronx Assemblyman Michael Benjamin.
Assemblyman Angelo Santabarbara (D-Schenectady) attended one of the briefings on Monday.
“Certainly I spoke up … because this was not something I thought was a good idea from the start,” Santabarbara said.
Aside from objections to the blanket release policy, he said other Assembly Democrats raised questions and complained about why cops and prosecutors were only given 15 days under the law to turn over evidence to defendants.
“Some of these municipalities can’t comply … Are officers going to even want to use the body cameras anymore? Now we have a situation where they might not be able to process the footage in time. These are choices we don’t want law enforcement to have to make,” Santabarbara said.
Assemblyman Peter Abbate (D-Brooklyn) said constituents are angry after reading published accounts of turnstile justice.
“There has to be some tweaks to the law. There should be some discretion for judges,” Abbate said. “We should look at detaining repeat offenders.”
In retrospect, Abbate said, the bail reform shouldn’t have been crammed into last year’s budget.
“There should have been more sunshine for the bail reform. That’s how we got this confusion with the first plan,” he said.
There’s also angst over the bail law in the suburbs.
“The law needs to be tweaked,” Assemblywoman Amy Paulin (D-Scarsdale) said.
A recent Siena College poll found that New Yorkers have turned against bail reform.
Now 49 percent of New York State voters say the new policy is “bad” for New York compared to 37 percent who say it’s “good.”
That’s a stark turnaround from last April, when 55 percent of residents backed the law while only 38 percent were opposed.
Asked about the bail reform sessions, Heastie spokeswoman Kerri Biche said, “It was an informational meeting for members to ask questions that they’ve gotten from their districts.”
Cuomo and Senate Majority Leader Andrew Stewart-Cousins (D-Yonkers) said they are open to changes to the law.