NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — The New York City Council passed a bill that, if signed by the mayor, would establish jail population review teams dedicated to finding detainees who could be safely released into community-based support programs.
The bill is aimed at decreasing prison populations across New York City in order to close Rikers Island by 2027.
The City Council voted in 2019 to close Rikers, but Mayor Eric Adams and Department of Correction Commissioner Louis Molina have expressed concerns that the closure would be impossible by the 2027 deadline if prison populations in the city continue to trend upward.
The decision to close the prison was made amid a humanitarian crisis on the island. Reports from a federally appointed monitor have found violence at the prison goes unchecked, staff lavish in chronic absenteeism and the DOC fails to provide basic services to detainees.
City Councilmember Carlina Rivera, who sponsored the bill, told 1010 WINS the legislation is one tool for getting the city’s prison population to a point where it is feasible to close Rikers.
“Right now we are trying to figure out how we can get to 2027, and a key component of that is actually reducing the population at Rikers,” said Rivera. “We can’t throw up our hands. We can’t say Rikers is an intractable problem… This bill would really look at what I think is the biggest issue, in terms of capacity.”
Beyond the looming deadline to close Rikers, Rivera said the bill is designed to move people with serious mental illness from prisons into treatment programs, where they stand a better chance at recovery.
“Many of the individuals that are currently detained and incarcerated there should not be there. They are very sick. They have serious mental illness, and we just have to do better,” she said. “We have to responsibly remove people from the carceral system who do not belong.”
The bill enjoyed the support of Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, who said Thursday that Rikers is “undermining public safety in New York City.” It is not yet clear, though, whether Mayor Eric Adams will sign the bill into law.
Neither the mayor’s office nor the DOC responded to 1010 WINS’ request for comment on the bill.
The Council also signed two other prison reform bills on Thursday. One would require the DOC to submit annual reports on the health outcomes of pregnant prisoners. The other called on the state legislature to pass the Treatment Not Jails Act, which would expand eligibility for court-mandated mental health and substance abuse treatment in place of incarceration.
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