Thumbs down for Kew Gardens jail
Community Board votes against Mayor de Blasio’s plan for borough-based detention center
BY MARK HALLUM
Community Board 9 did
not have any support to give to
Mayor Bill de Blasio’s boroughbased
jail proposal for a site in
Kew Gardens when on March 12
neighborhood representatives
struck it down in a resolution
with a unanimous vote of 34-0.
Although the vote is advisory
and may not hold traction when
the City Planning Commission
and City Council get the final
say on the ULURP application
to build a proposed 29 story,
1.9 million square foot facility
behind the Queens Supreme
Court as an alternative to
shipping detainees back and
forth from Rikers Island as well
as reducing the jail population.
“First, this proposal,
designed without any
communication with the
affected communities, will quite
simply overwhelm and destroy
the small historic residential
neighborhood of Kew Gardens,
and also adversely affect
the adjacent community of
Briarwood,” the resolution
reads. “Secondly, starting
the ULURP clock, before the
New York State legislature
can address comprehensive
criminal justice reform is
putting the cart before the horse.
To proceed at this point is to
present the New York taxpayer
with a potential bill upwards of
$30 billion for jails that may not
be needed.”
Many opponents to the
proposal to close Rikers claim
they are not against criminal
justice reform, but they
have chimed in at previous
community meetings that to
bring a jail to the Queens would
only transport the problems
associated with island to a new
facility while also increasing
congestion and bringing
crime into the surrounding
neighborhoods with affluent
property values.
City officials at a Feb. 28
meeting told angry members of
the Queens Advisory Council
meeting that the plan is fluid
and still a decade away, thus the
actual layout of any jail would
be fluid giving time for the state
to act on jail reform legislation.
But the Kew Gardens jail may
not be making waves in every
community board district.
Frank Gulluscio, the district
manager of Community Board 6,
which represents communities
neighboring the Kew Gardens
Photo via Wikimedia Commons
jail, explained that while his
office has not received more
that 2 caller complaints, more
neighborhoods should have
been brought into the loop with
city officials who have advanced
a public outreach effort some
say was not included in the
beginning of the process.
“Everybody will be affected,
one way or the other,” Gulluscio
said. “Since the city is talking
about community involvement
and transparency, the other
boards should certainly
been part and parcel of the
conversation.”
Gulluscio added that the CB6
meeting on March 13 had seen
no mention during the public
comment period regarding the
jail and no resolutions of any
kind to oppose the proposal had
been made at any time. He also
attributed this to the possibility
that not many people are aware
of the proposal.
CB6 covers Forest Hills and
Rego Park.
Borough President Melinda
Katz, a supporter of the decadelong
plan to close the jail
complex on Rikers Island, took
a different path in a March 8
letter to de Blasio in which she
called for his administration to
not back down on the deal, but to
restart the process and include
more community involvement.
“As you know, we have
been–and continue to be–
strong proponents of closing
Rikers Island and share with
you the goal of reforming and
modernizing the city’s jail
system,” Katz, who is currently
running for Queens District
Attorney, said. “The irony,
however, of unveiling a citywide
plan for “modern communitybased
jails” in the absence of
community input is not lost on
the boroughs… The backlash to
the current plan is what happens
when affected communities
are not treated as partners
in reform.”
Raul Contreras, a spokesman
from the Mayor’s office, said
that although they are currently
working with the public to
include them in the dialogue,
restarting the process is not in
the cards.
“We’re working with local
residents every day to create
a jail system that shortens the
distance between detainees
and the family and support
networks that are so crucial to
their eventual re-entry into the
community,” Contreras said.
“We continue to respond to the
concerns of local residents,
but we won’t delay our mission
to close Rikers and improve
conditions for those detained
and for their families supporting
their rehabilitation.”
But an earlier conversation
QNS had with Tyler Nims,
executive director to the
Lippman Commission, which
was chosen by the de Blasio
administration to implement
jail reform, illustrated by those
involved in the process why
facilities on the Rikers Island
simply cannot be renovated
and rebuilt as asked by
community members.
“What you can’t fix is the
isolation,” Nims said. “I think
people sort of think, ‘Well, it’s a
jail, it should be isolated,’ but it’s
an environment where people
are constantly going in and out
… Most the people there are
awaiting pre-trial, that’s like 80
percent. So they have to be taken
periodically – 10 or 11 times is
the average – to a court in one
of the five boroughs, and then
back, to see a judge for about
five minutes.”
Nims compared Rikers to
Roosevelt Island as it was once
known as Blackwells Island,
where the city’s criminals were
housed in the 19th century;
while borough-based jails will
address an age-old issue of
isolation in the correctional
system, it will also reduces
the population by providing
less capacity and present
development opportunities on
the island.
The Kew Gardens jail is
currently projected to hold
only about 1600 detainees and
will be one of four in each of
the five boroughs except Staten
Island. Rikers has a total of 10
jail facilities.
The CPC has until March 25 to
decide whether or not to approve
the ULURP application.
28 TIMESLEDGER, MARCH 22-28, 2019 BT FT TL QNS.COM
/QNS.COM
