https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...-rikers-island
New York is building the worldâs tallest jail in Chinatown. Can anyone stop it?
Planners say the facility will help heal the criminal justice system. But local residents see a brutal symbol of incarceration
Wilfred Chan in New York
Mon 21 Aug 2023
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For nearly two centuries, New York Cityâs Chinatown has been home to a quintessentially American story: immigrant workers and their families living shoulder-to-shoulder in low-slung tenements. Workers like Dennis Chung, the owner of Pasteur Grill and Noodles, a Vietnamese pho joint heâs run at the neighborhoodâs western edge for 27 years â weathering disasters like 9/11, Hurricane Sandy and Covid.
Now another symbol of the American condition is taking shape, directly across from Chungâs shop: a vast new jail. At about 300ft, the new structure is expected to be the tallest correctional facility in the world. And Chung says it could be the thing that finally sinks his business. âWith the jail on top of the pandemic, it might be over,â he tells me in Cantonese.
City officials and justice reform advocates say the new jail is a necessary project if theyâre going to close Rikers Island, the notoriously grim jail that New Yorkâs city council voted to shut down in 2019. That vote ordered the facility replaced by 2027 with four smaller jails throughout the city, including the one in Chinatown â which planners say will be a more humane institution conveniently located steps from downtown courthouses.
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The tower will replace a much shorter jail thatâs been on the site since the 1980s. But construction is well behind schedule, partially due to years of resistance from a diverse coalition that includes everyone from prison abolitionists to local landlords to, at one point, Eric Adams, who pledged to oppose the new jail when campaigning for mayor. They argue it will be an eyesore that could harm some of New Yorkâs most vulnerable immigrants, and that its multibillion-dollar price could be far better spent elsewhere.
Adams reversed course after taking office, and now the building crews have finally arrived. Today, lunchtime conversations at Pasteur Grill and Noodles are shattered by the crashing of demolition â the overture to a process that might well last a decade. âSo Iâll just need to put up with this,â says Chung, âor retire early.â
How did New York City end up moving forward with such a controversial carceral structure in the heart of its downtown? Is it, as opponents say, an ugly symbol of mass incarceration â or, as planners believe, a sign of a city slowly but surely righting its criminal justice ills? And could there still be a better way?
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The saga begins at Rikers Island: 413 acres in the East River, a stoneâs throw from the runways at LaGuardia airport, and the site of one of the most hellish penal facilities in the country. Though 85% of Rikers inmates have not been convicted and are simply waiting for a trial, the average detainee is held in the facility for nearly four months â four times the national average â and a disturbing number of people languish there for years, or have ended up dead.
In 2023, seven inmates have died, bringing the total death count since Adams took office to 26 â a toll that federal prosecutors have called âa collective failure with deep rootsâ. Investigators have found crumbling buildings, unsanitary conditions and Rikers guards systemically abusing inmates, and a federal judge has threatened to place the jail under federal control if the city canât end the chaos.
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Thereâs no serious debate, even in Chinatown, about whether Rikers needs to be shut down. The real controversy has always been over what to do afterward.
One of the proponents of âborough-based jailsâ â the plan for four new structures, in Brooklyn, Queens, the Bronx and Manhattan â is Dana Kaplan, a prison reform advocate who in 2018 became deputy director of the then mayor Bill de Blasioâs office of criminal justice, where she helped conceptualize the proposal. Now sheâs a senior adviser on the cityâs independent commission for criminal justice reform. âThis is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to try and transform the cityâs criminal justice system into something that is more humane,â she says.
âŠ.. In Chinatown, the jail tower will replace a brutalist-style, 15-floor, 900-bed detention center called âthe Tombsâ, also known for its grim conditions. The revamped facility is expected to have roughly the same bed count, but with new quality-of-life features like recreation centers, health clinics and visitation areas with childrenâs playrooms â all things that residents, family members and staff requested during âhundreds of hoursâ of focus groups, Kaplan says. âIt would be a fundamentally different experience for people who are incarcerated, but also for staff.â
That, Kaplan says, explains why the new jail must be taller. âJust being frank, it was impossible to achieve those elements in the square footage provided by the existing department of corrections facilities,â she says.
âŠ.. Itâs kind of like building a bridge as youâre crossing over it,â says Jan Lee, a local landlord and founder of Neighbors United Below Canal Street, a group that opposes the new jail.
Based on the new jailâs approved zoning permit, Lee anticipates a âmassive building, extending two to three blocks in every direction, that rises as tall as the Statue of Libertyâ â which stands at 305ft. âThis is going to be the beacon of Chinatown,â he says. âNo matter where you look downtown, you will see this jail.â When itâs coupled with the cityâs criminal court, and another federal prison a few blocks down, âChinatown will be known as Jail Town,â he says.
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Christopher Marte, a local progressive city councilman who also joined the protest, says the delays are an opportunity. He thinks thereâs a good chance that by the time the city is ready to break ground on Chinatownâs new jail â currently estimated to cost more than $2bn â it wonât have enough money to pull it off. âTheyâre going to get to a point where they canât build the tallest jail. And they might have to take what weâve been pitching, which is adaptive reuse of the space,â he says. âSo this is not a done deal.â
âŠ.. The residents of Chinatown also appear to have given up. Last week, at a long-awaited town hall in the neighborhood with Adams, Jan Lee was the sole resident who questioned the mayor about the jail. Lee didnât demand the jail be stopped â but only asked Adams for âa seat at the design table to make sure that this is right size, right scale and right for our community with the least amount of impactâ.
Adams agreed. He also reminded the audience that the jail wasnât his idea: âI would have done it differently. But thatâs the reality, that I inherited a broken city that we have to now fix.â Then he issued a dark warning of what could happen if the new jail didnât get built. âWeâre going to have to take [Rikers residents] who may have done violent crimes, and because we donât have any room, weâre going to put them back on the streets? I have a problem with that.â
Nobody in the room challenged him. The opposition was tired. The worldâs tallest jail inched closer to reality.
What else could one do? âWe already tried opposing it, protesting it, and it didnât work,â says Chung, the noodle shop owner. âI just hope they build it faster, so things can hopefully get back to normal.â
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