28 THE QUEENS COURIER • APRIL 6, 2017 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM THE QUEENS editorial Publisher & E ditor Co-Publisher Associate Publisher Editor-In-Chief VP, Events, Web & Social Media Art Director Artist Social Media Manager Staff Reporters Contributing Reporters Assistant to Publisher Classified Manager Controller President & CEO Vice President Victoria Schneps-Yunis Joshua A. Schneps Bob Brennan Robert Pozarycki Amy Amato-Sanchez Nirmal Singh Ron Torina Emily Davenport Katrina Medoff, Anthony Giudice, Angela Matua Suzanne Monteverdi Cliff Kasden, Samantha Sohmer, Elizabeth Aloni Deborah Cusick Celeste Alamin Maria Valencia Victoria Schneps-Yunis Joshua A. Schneps Schneps Communications, 38-15 Bell Blvd., Bayside, NY 11361 718-224-5863 • Fax 718-224-5441 www.qns.com editorial e-mail: editorial@qns.com for advertising e-mail: ads@qns.com Entire Contents Copyright 2017 by The Queens Courier All letters sent to THE QUEENS COURIER should be brief and are subject to condensing. Writers should include a full address and home and office telephone numbers, where available, as well as affiliation, indicating special interest. Anonymous letters are not printed. Name withheld on request. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR, AS WELL AS OP-ED PIECES IN NO WAY REFLECT THE PAPER’S POSITION. No such ad or any part thereof may be reproduced without prior permission of THE QUEENS COURIER. The publishers will not be responsible for any error in advertising beyond the cost of the space occupied by the error. Errors must be reported to THE QUEENS COURIER within five days of publication. Ad position cannot be guaranteed unless paid prior to publication. Schneps Communications assumes no liability for the content or reply to any ads. The advertiser assumes all liability for the content of and all replies. The advertiser agrees to hold THE QUEENS COURIER and its employees harmless from all cost, expenses, liabilities, and damages resulting from or caused by the publication or recording placed by the advertiser or any reply to any such advertisement. SUNSET OVER MASPETH // PHOTO BY ROBERT POZARYCKI Send us your photos of Queens and you could see them online or in our paper! To submit them to us tag @queenscourier on Instagram, visit our Facebook page, tweet @QNS or email editorial@qns.com (subject: Queens Snaps). What should we do about Rikers Island? Closing Rikers Island over the next decade may be one of the most difficult tasks the city has ever been challenged to complete. Mayor Bill de Blasio admitted as much in announcing the effort on March 31. Much has been said about the conditions on the island of prisons, how its separation from the city proper helped create an isolated culture of inhumanity and violence where the well-being of prisoners and guards is at risk every day. The most immediate challenge is logistical; it is also the most important challenge. Where else can the city find space for thousands of prisoners beyond Rikers? There are jails across the city, but others will need to be opened to accommodate them. That’s going to happen even as de Blasio eyes further criminal justice reform that will ultimately reduce the city’s need for jail space. Building new jails to replace Rikers will be a difficult sell for this city, and especially in Queens. Consider the furious protests unleashed almost every time a new homeless shelter pops up in an underused hotel. That response comes for something that houses people who are law-abiding, down-on-theirluck persons. No community in this borough would accept a correctional facility for criminals without a tremendous fight. We imagine that would hold true for other parts of the city where jails would be proposed. The ideal solution would be to renovate Rikers over a period of time, building and rebuilding different facilities to house prisoners based on their security risks and needs. On paper, it would seem better to keep prisoners as far away from us as possible; simply reforming and renovating the prisons might seem like all that’s needed. But Retired State Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman, who led the commission investigating Rikers Island, made a great point: the geophysical separation of Rikers Island from the city also leads to a psychological disconnect among those who are put there. He noted that it “severs connections with families and communities, with harmful consequences for anyone who spends even a few days on the island.” That’s something which no amount of renovation to Rikers Island could ever repair. How will we meet this challenge to close our city’s most abominable prison? Do we take up that challenge and find a way to make it happen without destroying neighborhoods? Do we make the attempt to overhaul Rikers in the hope that we can eliminate the violent culture there? Or do we just look away and pretend our city doesn’t have a problem? Honestly, we don’t have as of yet a good answer to these difficult questions. But we are very much interested in what you, the reader, believe should be done. Drop us a line by email to editorial@qns.com, or write to Robert Pozarycki, Editor-in-Chief, The Queens Courier, 38-15 Bell Blvd., Bayside, NY 11361. STORY: Queens residents can expect their Con Edison bills to go up starting this Saturday SUMMARY: In order to help bail out the aging nuclear power plants that are operating in upstate New York, the PSC is moving forward with their plan to increase utility rates for Con Edison customers. REACH: 46,651 (as of 4/3/17)
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