Mayor signs laws to make Hart Island a “dignifi ed resting place”
BY MARK HALLUM
AMNEWYORK REPORTER
The long quest to reform
Hart Island was realized
Wednesday as Mayor de Blasio
signed legislation to transfer
the potter’s fi eld out of the jurisdiction
of the NYC Department
of Corrections and into
the hands of the NYC Parks
Department.
Within the massive indigent
burial ground lay an estimated
million people who
were often unidentifi ed at the
time of their deaths. During
the AIDS crisis, especially, it
served as mass burial site for
NEW CARD
DESIGN!
gay men and addicts whose
bodies went unclaimed.
Often those who die in city
detention are buried there by
fellow detainees, hence DOC’s
authority over the small island.
The City Council recently
passed legislation that Councilman
Ydanis Rodriguez
sponsored for the transfer of
Hart Island to Parks Department
jurisdiction.
A separate bill, also signed
into law Wednesday, requires
the NYC Department of Transportation
to organize a means
for the public to visit Hart Island.
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The 131-acre island has storied
past in the city’s history.
During the Civil War,
it served as an internment
camp; then a psychiatric institution,
and a Nike Missile
launch site, according to the
mayor’s offi ce.
“Now the folks who have
been buried on Hart Island
over generations – they are
New Yorkers, they are part
of the fabric of our life. And I
think it’s a reminder to us all
there are so many people who
built this city, who made this
city great, whose names we
will never know, and that’s a
sad reality, but does not take
away their personhood, it
does not take away their place
in history. It doesn’t take away
who they were as human beings,”
de Blasio said. “It’s important
to recognize that an
injustice was done to so many
and we will not let that be the
way the story ends.”
With the new legislation,
the NYC Department of Social
Services will also be required
to hold a public hearing on
public burials, and the NYC
Human Resources Administration
will also establish the
Offi ce of Burial Services.
Veteran Herbert Sweat salutes the mayor the councilmembers for bringing
more respect to those buried on Hart Island. Photo by Todd Maisel
Advocates for Hart Island watch as Mayor Bill de Blasio signs the bill into law as supporters hug. On left is long
time advocate Melinda Hunt. Photo by Todd Maisel