There’s encouraging news today from our legislative team in Sacramento.

When the California Assembly takes up the prison bill again next Monday, it won’t include a proposal for a sentencing commission sought by Senate Democrats and Governor Schwarzenegger. This is a victory for law enforcement throughout the state and a great credit to the hard work of our legislative team, which continues to take a leadership role on the prison bill.

We pushed back hard on the sentencing commission proposal. It would have created an unelected group of people with the power to essentially rewrite – and undermine – existing sentencing laws. Since 1984, legislators, criminal defense attorneys and other prisoner interest groups tried and failed at least eight times to create a sentencing commission empowered to weaken existing sentencing laws and undermine the will of voters who enacted the “Three Strikes” law.

Proponents of a sentencing commission recognize that their efforts to lessen sentences cannot win at the ballot box. Nor can they be passed through the legislature and enacted into law. That is why the sentencing commission idea was so dangerous and needed to be stopped in its tracks.

While we can feel good about killing off the sentencing commission concept for now, we must remain vigilant as the prison bill comes back for a vote in the Assembly.

While legislators keep trying to find a consensus on a controversial proposal that could release thousands of inmates from state prisons, the LAPPL continues to press lawmakers to find responsible ways to achieve savings without letting prisoners go free.

As evidenced by the sentencing commission idea being scuttled, our voices are being heard and we need to keep the pressure on. Please join us in letting legislators know that we expect them to pass a prison bill we can live with – one that doesn’t undermine all of the public safety gains we have worked so hard to achieve over the past several years.