Ad campaign features New York mayor saying he liked smoking pot

NEW YORK (AP) _ Mayor Michael Bloomberg stares out from the full-page ad in The New York Times, a quote bubble emerging from his mouth. The quote: ``You bet I did. And I enjoyed it.'' <br><br>The

Tuesday, April 9th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

NEW YORK (AP) _ Mayor Michael Bloomberg stares out from the full-page ad in The New York Times, a quote bubble emerging from his mouth. The quote: ``You bet I did. And I enjoyed it.''

The question: whether he had ever smoked marijuana.

Bloomberg's remark, made to a New York magazine reporter last year before he was elected mayor, has become the centerpiece of an advocacy group's advertising campaign urging New York City to stop arresting and jailing people for smoking marijuana.

The $500,000 campaign will feature bus shelter signs and telephone booth posters carrying the quote, the Washington-based National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws said Monday. It also includes radio spots and the Times ads, the first of which appeared in Tuesday's editions.

Bloomberg said Monday that the city would continue making such arrests, no matter what he may have said in the past.

``I'm not thrilled they're using my name,'' he said. ``I suppose there's that First Amendment that gets in the way of me stopping it.''

The mayor didn't say when he smoked marijuana.