Districting quirk means Queens has key role in final Close Rikers plan

Close Rikers activists demonstrated at the entrance to Rikers Island in June. The City Council’s Land Use Committee voted in favor of a map change to permanently close the jails on Oct. 10. Eagle photo by Phineas Rueckert.

By David Brand

The land use review process for the city’s borough-based jail plan spanned every borough but Staten Island and required recommendations from the four corresponding borough presidents and local community boards. But the latest phase of the mission to close Rikers depends largely on Queens — and will likely include input from the next borough president.

The City Council’s Land Use Committee voted Thursday in favor of a map change that would permanently close Rikers jails by specifically excluding the construction and use of detention facilities. For months, the city has maintained that closing Rikers is the core intent of its broader borough-based jail plan. Nevertheless, as justice reform advocates have pointed out, that language was missing from the unprecedented proposal to build four new 1,150-bed detention facilities. 

The Rikers map change would correct that oversight by Dec. 31, 2026, but it is not actually a part of borough-based jail plan that heads to a final City Council vote on Oct. 17.

A quirk of community districting gives Queens outsized influence on the final closure of the nine isolated and outdated jails on Rikers: Though the island is technically part of the Bronx, it is located in Queens Community District 1. 

That means Queens Community Board 1 and the Queens Borough President will make recommendations on the map change plan as part of the Universal Land Use Review Procedure, or ULURP, a monthslong process that enables affected communities to review and address zoning changes.  

But who will be the borough president once the ULURP application reaches Borough Hall for a recommendation? 

Current Borough President Melinda Katz is favored to win the Nov. 5 general election for Queens district attorney. Her victory would vacate the borough president’s office on Jan. 1, 2020 and Deputy Borough President Sharon Lee would take over until a special election is held in February or March 2020. Neither Katz nor Lee responded to requests for comment for this story.

Katz has made it clear that she wants to close the jails on Rikers Island, but she rejected the city’s plan to build four new jails, including one behind the Queens Criminal Courthouse in Kew Gardens. Queens Community Board 9 unanimously voted against the plan in its advisory role in May. 

Six local leaders have announced their candidacy for Queens borough presidency ahead of the potential special election: Councilmembers Costa Constantinides, Donovan Richards, Paul Vallone and Jimmy Van Bramer; former Councilmember Elizabeth Crowley and Assemblymember Alicia Hyndman. Their perspectives on the map change, and the city’s borough-based jail plan, vary.

Richards, a member of the Council’s Land Use Committee, is the only candidate to come out in full support of the borough-based jail plan ahead of Thursday’s Council vote. He announced his support in an op-ed for the Eagle Monday. He also voted in favor of the map change to close what he called “the most notorious jail in the country” on Oct. 10. 

"This is an important step towards putting an end to the cycle of mass incarceration,” Richards told the Eagle. “As Borough President, I would vote the same way as I did on the Land Use Committee — strongly in favor of this fundamental change.”

Constantinides, chair of the Council’s Environmental Protection Committee, advocates for turning Rikers Island into a renewable energy powerhouse. He has not announced his commitment to the city’s broader jail plan, but he said he supports the map change to close Rikers and achieve ambitious environmental goals.

Green infrastructure and wastewater treatment on the island “will make places like western Queens healthier, so our children aren’t regularly sent to the hospital for an asthma attack,” Constantinides said. 

“I look forward to supporting this plan, if elected borough president, to ensure Rikers Island is never used to detain another soul after 2026. This is a moral imperative we’re going to codify into law,” he added.

Van Bramer opposes the borough-based jail plan because he thinks the city should invest more in communities and decarceration rather than construct four new, large-scale facilities. He said he supports the map change to close Rikers jails permanently, however.

“I think the land use action is smart. We should declare that Rikers must close and can never again be used for a jail,” he said. “But I’m still opposed to the building of four new mega jails.”

“I’m a no vote on the [borough-based jail] plan still,” he added. “I contend that we can close Rikers and we should close Rikers without investing $10 billion in new jails.”

Councilmember Paul Vallone also opposes the city’s borough-based jail but for different reasons. Vallone has called for a commission to study keeping Rikers jails open. He did not respond to requests for comment for this story.

Hyndman said she would defer to CB1 if she had to make a recommendation on the map change.

“As borough president, I would respect the decision of the Community Board, but we need a conversation on where do we house people,” she said, adding that she questions the current borough-based jail plan.

Crowley, former chair of the council’s Committee on Public Safety, said she supports “the concept of closing the dilapidated jails on Rikers Island.” She wants the city to reopen the Queens Detention Center, located behind the Queens Criminal Courthouse. The city contends that is not an option.

There are still months to go before anyone has to make a recommendation on the plan, however.

“It’s way too early in the process to give any information” on the map change plan, said Queens Community 1 Board District Manager Florence Koulouris.

“Rikers Island is a very peculiar situation,” Koulouris said. “We have the only land mass access, but it is the Bronx. It’s going to be quite some time before we know what to expect.”

The council’s vote Thursday was the first step toward initiating the ULURP process, which begins when the city submits a completed map change application to the Department of City Planning review session. There is no specific time frame for when the city will submit the application, but once DCP accepts it, the ULURP process begins.

The various phases of the ULURP process are bound by specific, charter-mandated time limits and once DCP accepts the city’s application, Community Board 1 will have 60 days to submit its recommendation. The Queens Borough President will have 30 days after that to submit their recommendation. 

Because Rikers is in the Bronx, Bronx Borough President Rubén Díaz Jr. will also cast an advisory vote, according to the City Planning Commission. Diaz has advocated for closing Rikers, but he has opposed the city’s jail plan because he does not want the jail located at the site of an NYPD tow pound in Mott Haven. He wants it closer to the Bronx courthouse.