Cy Vance’s reefer madness

Let’s be clear here: The issue of arrests and prosecutions for smoking pot in public is not about bigoted law enforcement. It’s about rival claims on public space by people of the same ethnicity — with cops and prosecutors in the middle.

Apparently cowed by a Page One New York Times story, Manhattan DA Cy Vance says he’ll no longer prosecute pot-smoking cases. That’s a grave disservice to parents and others who object to the practice.

Mayor de Blasio, meanwhile, stalled: He says he has the NYPD reviewing its marijuana-arrest policies over the next month.

Yet City Councilman Fernando Cabrera (D-Bronx) says public toking is a top concern for his constituents and wants cops to keep responding to complaints: “Please do not slow down.”

And while Bronx DA Darcel Clark would rather see tickets than arrests for these violations, she’s not following Vance’s lead on prosecutions. No other DA is, either.

The Times and others claim that cops must be targeting minorities, since these arrests are more common in black and Hispanic areas. But the NYPD insists that’s because it gets more complaints in those neighborhoods — and that the Times’ stats to the contrary are based on incomplete complaint data.

Part of the Times’ problem here is its all-too-typical blindness to socioeconomic reality: The conflict over public space is more stark in lower-income neighborhoods for the simple reason that people there can’t afford as much private space.

That’s why tickets for public drinking show the same “racial disparity” — and why this issue won’t go away even if New York fully legalizes marijuana. (Not unless it also legitimizes lighting up by schools, playgrounds, elder centers, etc.)

It’s one thing to ease off on prosecutions for possession, as Vance and Brooklyn DA Eric Gonzalez have done: That’s likely in line with public opinion. But public toking is a public nuisance, and police and prosecutors have a duty to protect the public from it.

Vance is selling out the silent majority in minority communities to win praise from ignorant, well-off liberals. Pray de Blasio and Police Commissioner James O’Neill don’t make the same mistake.