Council calls on mayor to reverse cuts to recidivism-reducing programs
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City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams called on Mayor Eric Adams and his administration to restore cuts to programming aimed at reducing recidivism in the Council’s budget response released Monday, April 1, 2024. Photo by John McCarten/NYC Council Media Unit
By Jacob Kaye
The City Council on Monday demanded the city’s upcoming budget include nearly $60 million in efforts aimed at providing programming and other services to New Yorkers in an effort to reduce recidivism.
Presenting their response to the mayor’s preliminary budget on Monday, leadership of the City Council called for the mayor to reverse a number of cuts he made in the past year to public safety and recidivism programming.
The call for increased funding for programs aimed at reducing recidivism comes as the number of people being jailed repeatedly has increased dramatically over the past decade and as the city’s jail population on Rikers Island has grown by over 1,000 detainees on average per day since Mayor Eric Adams took office two years ago.
“All the evidence shows recidivism is reduced by ensuring the evidence based interventions and programs in communities and in our justice system are reaching the people who need them the most,” City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams said from City Hall on Monday.
“Yet, many of these programs have been the target of cuts, or have lacked the investment over the past year,” she added. “The reality is that nearly everyone who enters the justice system, or is incarcerated, eventually returns to their communities. The city has a responsibility to invest in programs that are shown to reduce recidivism rather than cutting them.”
The Council’s push for increased funding for the programming comes as part of a larger demand that the Adams administration restore a large bulk of the cuts suggested in its preliminary budget released in January.
In all, the Council said it’s projecting an additional $6 billion in funds to spend on the city’s budget. They called for the funds to be used to restore cuts Mayor Eric Adams proposed to the city’s 3-K program, its libraries, Parks Department, schools, composting program and more.
“We have consistently said that the budget cuts made by the administration were far too broad and have negative impacts on our constituents and the stability of our city,” Speaker Adams said. “Today's Council budget response makes it clear that many of these were never necessary in the first place.”
“The Council's preliminary budget response lays out a balanced and responsible path for our city to achieve stability,” she added. “It's not a wish list, but rather a vision for the city's budget that fulfills our city's obligation to New Yorkers. It is a roadmap to strengthen our city government while preparing for the challenges ahead.”
Restoring ‘recidivism’ programming
When pitching the boost to public safety programming on Monday, Speaker Adams made note of the timeliness of the request.
Following several violent incidents throughout the city last week, including the fatal shooting of a police officer in Far Rockaway, the mayor said that recidivism is at the heart of the city’s crime problems.
Guy Rivera, the 34-year-old indicted Monday on charges for Officer Jonathan Diller’s murder last Monday, had been arrested 21 times before the shooting. Nine of the charges brought against him during those arrests were felonies, according to the NYPD.
“It's the same people over and over again,” the mayor said. “These are bad people who are doing bad things to good people. It's the good guys against the bad guys and we have to recognize that.”
According to a recent report from the city’s Independent Budget Office, the total number of unique stays in the city’s jails has decreased by 73 percent from 2014 through 2023.
But the speaker said the city isn’t making the investment in the types of programming aimed at interrupting the flow of recidivism.
“The Council's [budget] response also confronts the issue of recidivism head on and we know it has been a focus of recent public discussion,” the speaker said on Monday.
In its response to the mayor’s preliminary budget released earlier this year, the City Council on Monday called for a $60 million restoration to cuts to programs aimed at reducing recidivism. File photo by Gerardo Romo/NYC Council Media Unit
The Council called for a $6.7 million investment in Alternative to Incarceration programs which provide services tailored to New Yorkers charged in a crime instead of sending them to jail.
The Council also called for the mayor to restore a $13 million cut to the city’s Supervised Release program, which employs nonprofits to provide supervision and support for New Yorkers awaiting trial, rather than putting those New Yorkers behind bars during that time period.
“[Individuals awaiting trial] are better served in their neighborhoods where community-based supervision can help to ensure their court appearances, achieve stability, and lower recidivism,” the Council said in its budget response.
Additionally, the Council called for an $8 million cut to reentry programming be restored.
The Adams administration and the Council clashed last year after the mayor ordered the Department of Correction to cut a $17 million contract with a number of nonprofit service providers offering programming to detainees on Rikers Island. At the time, the DOC, then led by former DOC Commissioner Louis Molina, claimed that the agency could provide the programming itself as effectively and as frequently.
That prediction was questioned by councilmembers who said they doubted the DOC had the will, let alone the ability, to provide as robust of services that were previously provided.
It turned out the lawmakers were right.
During the first four months after the contract was severed, the number of group-based programming offered to detainees on Rikers Island dropped by 29 percent and one-on-one sessions dropped by over 30 percent when compared to the same period the year prior, as first reported by the Eagle in January.
The DOC’s current commissioner, Lynelle Maginley-Liddie, in February asked two of the nonprofits given the ax by the agency in 2023 to return to Rikers to provide programming free of charge.
Around a week after the Eagle reported on the DOC’s request to the nonprofits, the mayor announced that the city would partially restore the cut contract, sending $14 million in funding for the return of the programming.
Mayor Eric Adams’ preliminary budget included cuts to programming the City Council said on Monday could reduce the city’s recidivism rate. File photo by Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Office
The Council on Monday said that putting more money into criminal justice programming would go a long way toward addressing the city’s crime issues.
“The reductions in funding for programs proven to lower recidivism over the past months only contribute to the city’s public safety challenges,” the Council’s budget response reads. “To make the city safer and healthier, the administration must prioritize support for evidence-based solutions to mental health challenges and recidivism. The Council urges the administration to increase funding for these programs.”
