Popping its head out of the sand

Impressively, and to its credit, the US Sentencing Commission has quickly followed up its public meeting yesterday by posting on the USSC website this Federal Register Notice of Final Priorities, in which the USSC identifies its policy priorities for the upcoming amendment cycle. The full notice covers a lot of interesting ground, and includes this prelude to the USSC’s lengthy list of planned priorities:

As part of its statutory authority and responsibility to analyze sentencing issues, including operation of the federal sentencing guidelines, the Commission has identified its policy priorities for the amendment cycle ending May 1, 2005, and possibly continuing into the amendment cycle ending May 1, 2006. While the Commission intends to address these priority issues, it recognizes that other factors, most notably the resolution of US v. Booker and US v. Fanfan, both of which currently are pending before the United States Supreme Court, as well as the enactment of any legislation requiring Commission action, may affect the Commission’s ability to complete work on any or all of the identified policy priorities by the statutory deadline of May 1, 2005.