LESSONS LEARNED WHILE ON THE BEAT
Op-ed: Vaccine uncertainty isn’t the
only health concern at Rikers
COURIER LIFE, JANUARY 15-21, 2021 23
WITH BROOKLYN BOROUGH PRESIDENT ERIC ADAMS
How to end the senseless bloodshed in the fi ve boroughs
James Solano was described
by his family and
friends as “energetic” —
a young man who always had
his mind on the future. He was
heavily involved in a local after
school program, and was
widely beloved by his counselors.
On December 23rd of last
year, just two days before
Christmas, he was shot in
the neck and killed outside
a bodega in Morrisania. He
was just a few blocks from his
home.
James was more than a statistic.
He had a unique life, and
his entire family and community
has been left devastated
by his untimely death. But his
senseless murder was part of
a disturbing trend in our city
that came amid an alreadydiffi
cult year. The week before
James was killed, Joseph Evans
was shot and killed while
getting a sandwich at a local
deli in Staten Island. The week
before that, two men were shot
outside a corner bodega in
East New York. Thankfully,
they only sustained non-lifethreatening
injuries.
But as someone who has
experienced a shooting fi rsthand
and lived to tell about it
can tell you, a bullet doesn’t
just tear through skin and
bone. It rips a hole in the fabric
of the community that can
take years, if not decades, to
repair.
In the fi rst eight months
of the pandemic, according to
a recent report from The New
York Times, there was a 63 percent
rise in shootings inside or
in front of bodegas and corner
stores. Bodega burglaries have
also tripled. The violence is by
no means limited to bodegas.
We are witnessing an overall
increase in a brazen kind of
violence that happens in broad
daylight, right in front of us.
In 2020, murders increased
by 40 percent from 2019 to 437,
the highest number since 2011.
Shootings almost doubled from
754 in 2019 to 1,493 in 2020, the
highest since 2006. The victims
of this tide of bloodshed
are almost always young men
of color.
We may feel powerless, in
the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic
and its accompanying
economic fallout, to do anything
to stop the carnage we’re
seeing on our streets. At times,
even I as a public offi cial have
been tempted toward cynicism
and despair. But there are basic
steps we can take as a City,
right now, to ensure this year
is safer for all New York residents,
particularly for the
residents of Black and brown
communities who have borne
the brunt of the violence.
First, the fact that many of
these shootings are happening
in broad daylight suggests
that people who want to commit
violent acts are not afraid
of being caught. That’s why
I believe we need to immediately
reinvent the NYPD’s
anti-crime unit, which was
disbanded last year, as an antigun
unit. We must also scale
up Operation Safe Shopper, a
pioneering program our offi ce
has spearheaded in business
corridors across Brooklyn,
that installs more cameras
on participating businesses
and connects them directly to
the local precinct to streamline
investigations and help
catch violent offenders more
quickly.
Second, much of this violence
has been concentrated in
low-income, Black and brown
communities around our city
like Morrisania, East New
York, and Tompkinsville. So
we must also shift far more police
to these areas. But we also
need to engage our entire ecosystem
of public safety in this
effort, by doubling funding to
the Crisis Management System
groups and violence interrupters
that we stood with
shortly after James Solano’s
murder.
Finally, as mentioned earlier,
much of the violence we
are seeing is happening outside
bodegas and the other
few public places people can
go during the pandemic. So
it is critical we allow building
owners to tax-exempt the
costs of any security improvements
to bodegas and similar
storefronts, including cameras,
sensors, and other safety
measures.
James Solano’s tragic
death, and the deaths of so
many others we lost last year,
cannot be in vain. As a father
of a young Black man, I am
tired of hearing about another
person of color shot in our city
and checking the headlines to
make sure my son hasn’t been
taken from me in a senseless
act of violence. With a new
year upon us, it’s time to put
an end to that anxiety that I
and so many other parents
across our city feel.
Eric Adams is borough president
of Brooklyn. He served 22
years in the New York City Police
Department (NYPD), retiring
at the rank of captain, as
well as represented District 20
in the New York State Senate.
Borough President Eric Adams.
BY COUNCILMAN KEITH POWERS
& REV. KEVIN VANHOOK
There is a long list of New
Yorkers who have been devastated
by the COVID-19 crisis:
essential workers, the working
poor, and parents struggling
to juggle remote school
with their own work, to name
a few.
Yet often lost in the conversation
is how the pandemic has
impacted justice-involved individuals.
Not only do those cycling
in and out of jail face an
extraordinary high-risk of contracting
the virus as they sit in
inhumane facilities where social
distancing is impossible
and access to health basics are
scarce, the pathway to stability
and success upon release has
become even more daunting.
Jails are hotspots for
COVID-19. At the height of the
pandemic, Rikers Island had
an infection rate that was approximately
four to fi ve times
higher than city and state averages.
We cannot let lack of
testing stop our fellow New
Yorkers from reuniting with
friends and family or fi nding
stable housing due to the fear
of the disease, or worse, increased
infection rates. Just
one day without a place to stay
can spell disaster and lead to
homelessness.
The City needs to take action
now to ensure the hundreds of
people returning home from
Rikers can get back on their
feet. While the Mayor’s administration
listed several positive
steps in a City Council hearing
last month to create a more
unifi ed reentry process, there
are key issues we must act on
now: providing COVID-19 testing
and eliminating NYCHA’s
permanent exclusion.
There are common-sense
solutions will stem the tide of
New York’s homelessness crisis
and greatly improve the
health, safety, and lives of
countless New Yorkers.
Given the high-risk jails
pose to community spread, it
is imperative that justice-involved
individuals are guaranteed
testing before they leave.
As we see an increase in density
in jails, this infrastructure
should mirror that of entry
testing to ensure COVID-19
does not spread.
In addition to addressing
private landlord discrimination,
we must confront lessdiscussed
discrimination in
public housing: the NYCHA
permanent exclusion.
This policy allows NYCHA
to unilaterally decide whether
someone with criminal history
is “non-desirable,” thereby
banning them from tenancy
for as long as 5 years. Only after
reapplying can former residents
have the chance at having
this status removed.
This unfair and unjust rule
mirrors the racist and unequal
treatment in our criminal legal
system. We know that people
of color in New York City are
far more likely to get arrested
than white residents. Rather
than try and right the wrongs
of the past, the NYCHA exclusion
policy actively legitimizes
this broken status quo.
NYCHA’s proposed changes
to this rule offer an opportunity
to create a public housing
system that treats formerly incarcerated
New Yorkers with
the respect and dignity they
deserve. We must eliminate
this discriminatory policy
once and for all.
These changes are nobrainers
that do not require a
meeting of the minds or timeconsuming
study. Time is of
the essence during this pandemic.
Council Member Keith Powers
represents New York City’s
District 4 in Manhattan. Rev.
Kevin VanHook presides at
Riverside Church in New York
City.