I think it's very interesting that Ms. Viverito's end goal is to close Rikers. I actually looked at this article Monday morning before it was assigned and have been thinking about it a bit. I like Viverito's idea of covering bail for people without the funds that have low level offenses. It's a great idea, why should we incarcerate people who aren't dangerous just because they can't come up with money? We are just wasting our time and resources. We have to pay for them to stay there for the 15 days or so, while they try and call everyone they know to borrow some cash. And for what? Because, like Ms. Viverito said, that you jumped a turnstile? That's absurd. As for her idea of shutting down Riker's completely, I'm not too sure about that one. I don't really see that happening just because it is such a popular, for lack of better term, jail. It would be great to see the incarcerated population there decrease, but I just can't see it closing down completely. Not in the near future anyway. -Leilani789
I think Ms. Viverito's plan is a good idea. The poor get arrested for something little and they end up spending weeks in a jail when people of higher classes get arrested for the same thing and are out in a couple hours. I don't think we should keep non violent people in jail because they cannot afford bail because they are taking up room that we could be using for violent offenders. Its also wasting a lot of money because we will have to pay for them if they stay in jail which will probably end up costing more. I think her goal of closing Riker's island is not a realistic goal. You cannot just release all of those prisoners so you will have to put them in a prison somewhere else and we already have a over crowding problem. We don't have room to house all of those prisoners unless we release nonviolent offender from other prisons so then we can have somewhere for the violent offenders from Riker's island to go. dragons789
I like what Mark-Viverito is trying to do by covering bail costs for poorer individuals because it gives them a chance to pay for bail. I think it is great because if you could help the poorer people get bail the people who are innocent but too poor to afford bail won’t feel inclined to take a plea bargain to get out of jail even though they are did nothing wrong. I couldn’t imagine how bad it would be to sitting jail for somewhere around 15 days just for jumping a turnstile or another minor offense like it talks about in the article, it sounds terrible. With this happening it will definitely cut down on the jail population because instead of a person sitting in jail while they wait for trial they could get bail and wait for their day in court somewhere more comfortable. I think that her goal of closing down Riker's Island can be an obtainable goal, by making bail affordable to those who can afford it then it would cut down on the inflated inmate population drastically. Birdman789
I have to say that after reading this article, it is clear that the opposing sides have good arguments, but I lean more toward the side that supports the program to "cover bail for poor individuals charged with low-level criminal offenses who would otherwise be forced to wait in city jail for their court date (King 2016)." Based on the statistics, it seems that this program is effective in many ways. For one, they noticed that after incorporating this program, 97% of the people returned to all their court appearances-some to more than fifteen dates consecutively. Furthermore, out of 188 individuals, 62% ended in dismissals, 22% in a violation that carries no record, and 12% with a misdemeanor plea and no jail time. Based on the statistics, it seems that the program is effective in preventing recidivism, so I think that this should be implemented in various locations to help solve the over-crowdedness of the jails and prisons. Cards789
I totally agree and think its a great idea this program that helps low income people who cannot afford bail. So many people sit in jail for small crimes, nonviolent crimes to be specific. It's waisting time and money and space for people who actually need to be locked up. I think that many people who are convicted of crime would show up to their court dates and go through the whole process if the had the money to do so. Most of these people are from low income families and no nothing more than what they've grown up around. I think this idea could really clean up or criminal justice system and change a lot of things for many people. This program seems very successful and is preventing recidivism. -dicaprio 789
I really enjoyed this article I thought that her idea for helping poor people stay out of jail will really help. She has an end goal of completely shutting down Rikers. We need more people like here in the justice system she saw a huge problem with overcrowding and the fact that its unfair for the lower income inmates. Her plan would save so much money because its expensive to keep these people in jail especially when some of those people don't need to be in there. This plan will take a long time but I believe in the end it will be worth it. It would be cheaper to pay for the poor peoples bail than to keep them in these jails. Godzilla789
To me this is a very complicated and political minded article. This sounds like a good idea but how effective will it be depends on the amount of hoops people have to good through to get the money and to the process it self. To me it seems a little bit to complicated to work. But that may be the whole bureaucratic of it all. One part I think I understand is the money is going to go through a not for profit before given to the state. The one thing I think I like about it is that it is going to give non-violent offenders the chance to stay out of trouble and not become part of jail life. Jfl789
I think this plan is a great idea. If it will get a lot of people out that do not need to be there, I am with it. No one needs to be locked up on a nonviolent crime for a long period of time. I do agree with some form of punishment, that is. But overall I can see this being a great thing for the future. I have yet to hear about this until now. I listen to a lot of talk radio and fell like I should of heard it by now. Something great for the future, in my opinion. I like how she says if you were to do something not that bad and get arrested for it, your average waiting time on a court date is 15 days. She then says how people lose houses, jobs, and they cannot take care of their children. How are people supposed to get by? -Ibanez789
I do agree, the behind the scenes of being held behind bars has a huge effect on a persons well being. This portion of a persons life is never talked about. This goes to show the world doesn't stop when your locked up. The concept of paying someones bail if they fail to get a speedy trail is fair if the offense is low risk to society. I mean jumping a turnstile is just ridiculous. There is potential with the plan, but there needs to be a cut off with how many offenses and what warrants a release.
This article! First of all Melissa “the dream” Mark-Viverito, smoke half next time. Close Rikers Island? It’s a 400acre island with 10 jails on it. They have their own power plant and bakery for crying out loud :) Where are you going to put all these people? The article states it houses up to +10,000 inmates. In other articles the in and out is upwards of 77,000 people processed per year. Are you going to just dump them on surrounding institutions that are already overpopulated and underfunded? O.o. Now granted if they were locking up a bunch of young white kids this would’ve been fixed already, just getting that out there. A large majority of these people are awaiting trial in prison because they can't afford bail. That means some haven’t even been convicted of anything yet. That saddens me. $1000.00 might as well be $1 million. If you don’t have it, you don’t have it. Leave them in their communities with their families while they are awaiting trial. If and when you leave these individuals on the inside you could be destroying their chance to have a fair trial. Or properly be represented by a lawyer. Now don’t get me wrong if you’re out moving some dope you should keep enough back to get bailed out. Because eventually you’re going to get busted, and busted again. I feel an overhaul coming for this city and how they do their business but I don’t see the closure of Rikers. Making funds accessible for bail incentivizes criminal activity, low level or not, to commit crime. Who would be responsible for this ‘non for profit’ fund? Will they be scrutinized? Where or who is this money coming from? Will this be a quid pro quo political process? Enter Mayor Bill Blasio! He is all for the bail program and how it would help the unfairly imprisoned poor. But he states that this program as intended would cost billions of billions of dollars. And its his job to educate the population on these facts. I bet he thinks Viverito is crazy like a fox when it comes to closing Rikers. I like the ‘Supervised release program’ started by Blasio. That’s what I’m talking about. Drop the bail cost and substitute that with some programs. Whether they work it off or spend some time in a classroom. You can’t lock up that much of your population and not expect it to impact your community negatively. Soooooo, Council woman Melissa here is your bag of Doritos and box of Twinkies. Go sleep it off ,the Mayor is taking care of business. “Robing Peter to pay Paul” Doberman789
I think closing Rikers island will be a good idea. But I dont think its just that simple. Over 11,000 people are housed there, where are they gonna go? I agree with Doberman789's point about how the could be sent to surrounding jails but those are overcrowding just like rikers island. There are a few kinks to work out with the system, but I hope it comes to the conclusion of closing rikers island.I like the quote from the article when Mark-Viverto says that something as simple as jumping a turnstile can lead to someone being locked up and the could lose their job and house. This is not justice is what she continued to say about it. I agree with this and closing rikers could help, but other things need to happen especially with the way policing is conducted in New York.
This may seem like a good initiative but to close Riker’s Island seems more like far-fetched wishful thinking. Riker’s has ten jails and has an average daily population of 10,000 inmates. Riker’s even has an LGBT housing unit, an establishment not seen in other jails or prisons, yet. Creating bail-funds for minor offenses is plausible, but if Mark-Viverito wishes it to close completely, there are a slew of other factors to consider. My main question would be where would the lower/poor class citizens go? We are talking about New York City, a city where the homeless have a famous notoriety to them. It’s not uncommon for the homeless or other minor-violators to commit crimes so they have a life they deem as better than what they had on the outside, especially during the wintertime. The article states that the bailing system is broken and has a cap to it. Once this is situated in ways that Mr. Rivera has brought to light then perhaps they could shut down one or two of the facilities. De Blasio’s program also seems to be a great start. Closing Riker’s would mean a return for those who committed minor offenses, yes, but it is false if these leaders wish it to close completely. Twenty years down the road may sound like a logistically sound goal. I’m just more skeptical against this because they sound so strong in doing it without much of a plan. - StrongArm789
I thought this article was very interesting. While it is a good idea to make this happen, it will also be very hard to do. She may mean well but this plan is a very complicated plan. If there are that many people in those jails for that little of convictions then it'll be hard to get that amount of money to cover all of those costs. I could see it happening if we started out with process close to this and if bail wasn't so much. But just with ten inmates, if bale was an average of $2,000 for each person, it would be $20,000 for just those ten people. That's a lot of money to be raised for this project. But if there is a person willing to put forth the effort, then I guess anything is possible. Although that sounds cheesey, it is very true. The mayor is even on their side, just has doubts that it will even be able to work. ICCRunner789
I thought this was an interesting take on handling the overcrowding that is becoming an epidemic in the US. New York has a lot of homeless people, this may be who the target audience for Mark-Viverito. The concept sound good on paper, that idea being: Those that are awaiting trial are housed in our jails and require resources that in return goes to them costing the facility to house them. Using the PCJ model with an inmate at $66 a day times that by 15 you will get about $900. That is a lot! Now think about the amount that is awaiting trial? That plan may work, but at the cost of taxpayers. Riker's Island has a lot going for it, the facility is a business like PCJ though they take a good amount of time with housing. There is segregation and even a pod for those that are of different sexual orientation even. Riker's Island is very developed and could be a good unit for a larger scale prison opposed to a bunch of smaller prisons. The idea's that are proposed always sound good on paper. There needs to be a plan that is discussed on how and the steps that it takes to get to that goal.
The idea of an initiative that provides the poor with an alternative to jail via bail and bonds is astounding. This would provide the jails of New York the opportunity to reduce overcrowding. It also gives those charged with low level crimes an opportunity to go home and prepare for their court dates and create a suitable defense. The most important aspect of the initiative the state is taking, is the idea of making bonding and bail a government based operation. This removes the middle man; ie. the bail-bond companies. The bail-bond companies are a for profit option to bail oneself out of jail. The bond offices charge exorbitant amounts of capital to provide their services. This puts many people who are not financially stable at a disadvantage. This initiative would provide equality for everyone involved and alleviate the strain of overcrowding in jails. I believe it would be in the interest of many people if more states looked into providing a similar service, comparative to that which New York may provide.
I think it's very interesting that Ms. Viverito's end goal is to close Rikers. I actually looked at this article Monday morning before it was assigned and have been thinking about it a bit. I like Viverito's idea of covering bail for people without the funds that have low level offenses. It's a great idea, why should we incarcerate people who aren't dangerous just because they can't come up with money? We are just wasting our time and resources. We have to pay for them to stay there for the 15 days or so, while they try and call everyone they know to borrow some cash. And for what? Because, like Ms. Viverito said, that you jumped a turnstile? That's absurd. As for her idea of shutting down Riker's completely, I'm not too sure about that one. I don't really see that happening just because it is such a popular, for lack of better term, jail. It would be great to see the incarcerated population there decrease, but I just can't see it closing down completely. Not in the near future anyway.
ReplyDelete-Leilani789
I think Ms. Viverito's plan is a good idea. The poor get arrested for something little and they end up spending weeks in a jail when people of higher classes get arrested for the same thing and are out in a couple hours. I don't think we should keep non violent people in jail because they cannot afford bail because they are taking up room that we could be using for violent offenders. Its also wasting a lot of money because we will have to pay for them if they stay in jail which will probably end up costing more. I think her goal of closing Riker's island is not a realistic goal. You cannot just release all of those prisoners so you will have to put them in a prison somewhere else and we already have a over crowding problem. We don't have room to house all of those prisoners unless we release nonviolent offender from other prisons so then we can have somewhere for the violent offenders from Riker's island to go. dragons789
ReplyDeleteI like what Mark-Viverito is trying to do by covering bail costs for poorer individuals because it gives them a chance to pay for bail. I think it is great because if you could help the poorer people get bail the people who are innocent but too poor to afford bail won’t feel inclined to take a plea bargain to get out of jail even though they are did nothing wrong. I couldn’t imagine how bad it would be to sitting jail for somewhere around 15 days just for jumping a turnstile or another minor offense like it talks about in the article, it sounds terrible. With this happening it will definitely cut down on the jail population because instead of a person sitting in jail while they wait for trial they could get bail and wait for their day in court somewhere more comfortable. I think that her goal of closing down Riker's Island can be an obtainable goal, by making bail affordable to those who can afford it then it would cut down on the inflated inmate population drastically. Birdman789
ReplyDeleteI have to say that after reading this article, it is clear that the opposing sides have good arguments, but I lean more toward the side that supports the program to "cover bail for poor individuals charged with low-level criminal offenses who would otherwise be forced to wait in city jail for their court date (King 2016)." Based on the statistics, it seems that this program is effective in many ways. For one, they noticed that after incorporating this program, 97% of the people returned to all their court appearances-some to more than fifteen dates consecutively. Furthermore, out of 188 individuals, 62% ended in dismissals, 22% in a violation that carries no record, and 12% with a misdemeanor plea and no jail time. Based on the statistics, it seems that the program is effective in preventing recidivism, so I think that this should be implemented in various locations to help solve the over-crowdedness of the jails and prisons. Cards789
ReplyDeleteI totally agree and think its a great idea this program that helps low income people who cannot afford bail. So many people sit in jail for small crimes, nonviolent crimes to be specific. It's waisting time and money and space for people who actually need to be locked up. I think that many people who are convicted of crime would show up to their court dates and go through the whole process if the had the money to do so. Most of these people are from low income families and no nothing more than what they've grown up around. I think this idea could really clean up or criminal justice system and change a lot of things for many people. This program seems very successful and is preventing recidivism. -dicaprio 789
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed this article I thought that her idea for helping poor people stay out of jail will really help. She has an end goal of completely shutting down Rikers. We need more people like here in the justice system she saw a huge problem with overcrowding and the fact that its unfair for the lower income inmates. Her plan would save so much money because its expensive to keep these people in jail especially when some of those people don't need to be in there. This plan will take a long time but I believe in the end it will be worth it. It would be cheaper to pay for the poor peoples bail than to keep them in these jails. Godzilla789
ReplyDeleteTo me this is a very complicated and political minded article. This sounds like a good idea but how effective will it be depends on the amount of hoops people have to good through to get the money and to the process it self. To me it seems a little bit to complicated to work. But that may be the whole bureaucratic of it all. One part I think I understand is the money is going to go through a not for profit before given to the state. The one thing I think I like about it is that it is going to give non-violent offenders the chance to stay out of trouble and not become part of jail life.
ReplyDeleteJfl789
I think this plan is a great idea. If it will get a lot of people out that do not need to be there, I am with it. No one needs to be locked up on a nonviolent crime for a long period of time. I do agree with some form of punishment, that is. But overall I can see this being a great thing for the future. I have yet to hear about this until now. I listen to a lot of talk radio and fell like I should of heard it by now. Something great for the future, in my opinion. I like how she says if you were to do something not that bad and get arrested for it, your average waiting time on a court date is 15 days. She then says how people lose houses, jobs, and they cannot take care of their children. How are people supposed to get by?
ReplyDelete-Ibanez789
I do agree, the behind the scenes of being held behind bars has a huge effect on a persons well being. This portion of a persons life is never talked about. This goes to show the world doesn't stop when your locked up. The concept of paying someones bail if they fail to get a speedy trail is fair if the offense is low risk to society. I mean jumping a turnstile is just ridiculous. There is potential with the plan, but there needs to be a cut off with how many offenses and what warrants a release.
DeletePalmdaddy789
This article! First of all Melissa “the dream” Mark-Viverito, smoke half next time. Close Rikers Island? It’s a 400acre island with 10 jails on it. They have their own power plant and bakery for crying out loud :) Where are you going to put all these people? The article states it houses up to +10,000 inmates. In other articles the in and out is upwards of 77,000 people processed per year. Are you going to just dump them on surrounding institutions that are already overpopulated and underfunded? O.o. Now granted if they were locking up a bunch of young white kids this would’ve been fixed already, just getting that out there. A large majority of these people are awaiting trial in prison because they can't afford bail. That means some haven’t even been convicted of anything yet. That saddens me. $1000.00 might as well be $1 million. If you don’t have it, you don’t have it. Leave them in their communities with their families while they are awaiting trial. If and when you leave these individuals on the inside you could be destroying their chance to have a fair trial. Or properly be represented by a lawyer. Now don’t get me wrong if you’re out moving some dope you should keep enough back to get bailed out. Because eventually you’re going to get busted, and busted again. I feel an overhaul coming for this city and how they do their business but I don’t see the closure of Rikers. Making funds accessible for bail incentivizes criminal activity, low level or not, to commit crime. Who would be responsible for this ‘non for profit’ fund? Will they be scrutinized? Where or who is this money coming from? Will this be a quid pro quo political process? Enter Mayor Bill Blasio! He is all for the bail program and how it would help the unfairly imprisoned poor. But he states that this program as intended would cost billions of billions of dollars. And its his job to educate the population on these facts. I bet he thinks Viverito is crazy like a fox when it comes to closing Rikers. I like the ‘Supervised release program’ started by Blasio. That’s what I’m talking about. Drop the bail cost and substitute that with some programs. Whether they work it off or spend some time in a classroom. You can’t lock up that much of your population and not expect it to impact your community negatively. Soooooo, Council woman Melissa here is your bag of Doritos and box of Twinkies. Go sleep it off ,the Mayor is taking care of business. “Robing Peter to pay Paul” Doberman789
ReplyDeleteI think closing Rikers island will be a good idea. But I dont think its just that simple. Over 11,000 people are housed there, where are they gonna go? I agree with Doberman789's point about how the could be sent to surrounding jails but those are overcrowding just like rikers island. There are a few kinks to work out with the system, but I hope it comes to the conclusion of closing rikers island.I like the quote from the article when Mark-Viverto says that something as simple as jumping a turnstile can lead to someone being locked up and the could lose their job and house. This is not justice is what she continued to say about it. I agree with this and closing rikers could help, but other things need to happen especially with the way policing is conducted in New York.
ReplyDeleteCountryGirl789
This may seem like a good initiative but to close Riker’s Island seems more like far-fetched wishful thinking. Riker’s has ten jails and has an average daily population of 10,000 inmates. Riker’s even has an LGBT housing unit, an establishment not seen in other jails or prisons, yet. Creating bail-funds for minor offenses is plausible, but if Mark-Viverito wishes it to close completely, there are a slew of other factors to consider. My main question would be where would the lower/poor class citizens go? We are talking about New York City, a city where the homeless have a famous notoriety to them. It’s not uncommon for the homeless or other minor-violators to commit crimes so they have a life they deem as better than what they had on the outside, especially during the wintertime. The article states that the bailing system is broken and has a cap to it. Once this is situated in ways that Mr. Rivera has brought to light then perhaps they could shut down one or two of the facilities. De Blasio’s program also seems to be a great start. Closing Riker’s would mean a return for those who committed minor offenses, yes, but it is false if these leaders wish it to close completely. Twenty years down the road may sound like a logistically sound goal. I’m just more skeptical against this because they sound so strong in doing it without much of a plan. - StrongArm789
ReplyDeleteI thought this article was very interesting. While it is a good idea to make this happen, it will also be very hard to do. She may mean well but this plan is a very complicated plan. If there are that many people in those jails for that little of convictions then it'll be hard to get that amount of money to cover all of those costs. I could see it happening if we started out with process close to this and if bail wasn't so much. But just with ten inmates, if bale was an average of $2,000 for each person, it would be $20,000 for just those ten people. That's a lot of money to be raised for this project. But if there is a person willing to put forth the effort, then I guess anything is possible. Although that sounds cheesey, it is very true. The mayor is even on their side, just has doubts that it will even be able to work. ICCRunner789
ReplyDeleteI thought this was an interesting take on handling the overcrowding that is becoming an epidemic in the US. New York has a lot of homeless people, this may be who the target audience for Mark-Viverito. The concept sound good on paper, that idea being: Those that are awaiting trial are housed in our jails and require resources that in return goes to them costing the facility to house them. Using the PCJ model with an inmate at $66 a day times that by 15 you will get about $900. That is a lot! Now think about the amount that is awaiting trial? That plan may work, but at the cost of taxpayers.
ReplyDeleteRiker's Island has a lot going for it, the facility is a business like PCJ though they take a good amount of time with housing. There is segregation and even a pod for those that are of different sexual orientation even. Riker's Island is very developed and could be a good unit for a larger scale prison opposed to a bunch of smaller prisons. The idea's that are proposed always sound good on paper. There needs to be a plan that is discussed on how and the steps that it takes to get to that goal.
Palmdaddy789
The idea of an initiative that provides the poor with an alternative to jail via bail and bonds is astounding. This would provide the jails of New York the opportunity to reduce overcrowding. It also gives those charged with low level crimes an opportunity to go home and prepare for their court dates and create a suitable defense. The most important aspect of the initiative the state is taking, is the idea of making bonding and bail a government based operation. This removes the middle man; ie. the bail-bond companies. The bail-bond companies are a for profit option to bail oneself out of jail. The bond offices charge exorbitant amounts of capital to provide their services. This puts many people who are not financially stable at a disadvantage. This initiative would provide equality for everyone involved and alleviate the strain of overcrowding in jails. I believe it would be in the interest of many people if more states looked into providing a similar service, comparative to that which New York may provide.
ReplyDeleteSilverado789