In 2015, City Limits published the most comprehensive look to date at the political and policy dimensions of closing Rikers Island. Read those stories and our continuing coverage below.
Theodore Hamm | Amidst the splash created by Mayor de Blasio’s pledge to close Rikers, it’s somewhat surprising that there hasn’t been more attention to the future of broken-windows policing.
The city will sweat the details for a long time. But let’s give de Blasio his due for putting his stamp on history.
A veteran DOC officer writes: ‘We simply must develop the will to expend the money for services and staff, rather than on restraint chairs and solitary cells.’
A reform advocate, a former inmate and the head of the correction officers union discussed where the reforms of Rikers stand, whether they go far enough and what’s driving the surge in violence.
A former corrections captain maps out a planning process that to create the community detention facilities New York needs.
Nearly a year ago, the city’s Board of Correction voted to enact revised guidelines to address high rates of sexual abuse in the city’s correctional facilities. The final rule has encountered a chain a delays.
Is the uptick in knife violence on the streets a reflection of the increase in conflict inside the city’s jails?
Count Rev. Al Sharpton with Mayor de Blasio among the skeptics about the notion of closing Rikers Island.
Some want Rikers to close altogether. The mayor says that’s not a realistic goal. But a Manhattan Assemblyman says the de Blasio administration should at least move pre-trail detainees off the island.
What’s really behind the push to close Rikers—whether it’s moral clarity or fiscal concern—will determine whether mothballing the island actually makes New York a more humane place.
Melissa Mark-Viverito is launching a commission to look at alternatives. The rationale for—and complexities in—shuttering the island of jails was the focus of a November City & State/City Limits series.
Two women allege they were subjected to regular sexual abuse on the island. Naming them would punish the women for coming forward with complaints that have spurred a broader discussion about rape, power and incarceration.
“Closing Rikers Island is a great idea – but we must have fully operational alternatives in place first, not just some half-baked notions that are destined to fail.”
City Limits contacted all 51 members of the City Council, the five borough presidents and the three citywide officials to ask whether they support closing Rikers.
The jury is still out on whether reforms – segregating the most violent inmates, a crackdown on smuggling, faster use-of-force investigations – will be effective.
Read the City & State/ City Limitsseries on “Closing Rikers.”
Rikers’ physical reality, many agree, is a crucial part of its problem.
The key question might not be whether the city should live without Rikers, or how it would do so, but whether it has the political will to finish the transformation that has already started.
Citing rising violence, the city’s Department of Correction wants more ability to block visits or curtail physical contact. Opponents say the proposed changes are based on bad data and could do more harm than good.
