Assembly Minority Leader Will Barclay (R,C-Pulaski) and members of the Minority Conference gathered in Albany on Monday to urge Governor Kathy Hochul and her administration to take immediate action to resolve the crisis at the state’s correctional facilities including the repeal of the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement (HALT) Act. This follows a letter sent late last week by the conference seeking solutions that focused on solving the pressing issues in New York’s correctional facilities and chastised the governor for her announcement to close up to five more prisons in the middle of this critical moments.
Since the beginning of this demonstration outside the state’s correctional facilities, members of the Assembly Minority Conference have visited with the hardworking men and women employed at these facilities as well their families and supporters to take into consideration their concerns and understand how to remedy the situation. The feedback has painted a dire picture—signaling systemic failure that ignored the safety and well-being of correctional officers, staff and inmates. With conditions inside prison facilities reaching dangerous levels, Assembly Minority members are calling for a swift and satisfactory resolution.
According to statistics from the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, since the introduction of the HALT Act in March of 2022:
- Inmate-on-inmate assaults have increased 169%;
- Inmate-on-staff assaults have increased 76%; and
- Instances of contraband have increased 32%.
“The combination of prison closures, a massive staffing shortage and policies that make correctional officers’ (COs) jobs more difficult have created a powder keg environment inside state prisons. We are seeing record highs of inmate-on-staff and inmate-on-inmate assaults (up 76% and 169% respectively) since the implementation of the dangerous HALT Act, which restricts and sometimes eliminates the ability of our COs to segregate the most dangerous and violent inmates from the rest of the general population. More COs are retiring and resigning each year than are coming in. Currently, there are more than 2,200 CO vacancies. This is unacceptable, dangerous and unsustainable and must be addressed now,” said Assemblyman Phil Palmesano (R,C-Corning).
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