Jails Would Be Banned From Rikers Island Under Council Plan

NEW YORK — The City Council moved Thursday to set a hard deadline for closing Rikers Island's jails following criticism that Mayor Bill de Blasio's plan to shutter them was not legally binding.

The proposal would label Rikers a "public place" and ban the property from being used to jail people starting after Dec. 31, 2026 — the de Blasio administration's target date for replacing the island with four new, smaller lockups in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and The Bronx.

The council's Land Use Committee approved the resolution 11-2, with two lawmakers abstaining, after it was hastily added to the panel's Thursday agenda.

"By setting a date firm that is codified in law, the zoning law, we send a clear message to the public that Rikers is going to close," said Council Member Stephen Levin, a Brooklyn Democrat whose district includes the planned site of one new jail.

The resolution is an apparent response to prison-abolition activists' concerns that the city has not made a legal commitment to close Rikers — a place notorious for violence and inhumane conditions — despite officials' repeated promises to do so.

De Blasio, a Democrat, supports the proposal, which requires the council to ask the Department of City Planning to restrict how Rikers can be used by changing the official city map.

The council says that would be the first time on record that the entire chamber has submitted an application subject to the city's public land-use review process, known as the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, or ULURP.

"Closing Rikers was never in question, but by de-mapping the land it sits on, NYers can know with absolute certainty the island will never again be used as a jail," de Blasio Press Secretary Freddi Goldstein said on Twitter. "Instead, our city will be home to a smaller, fairer, more just criminal justice system."

But the move is unlikely to quell criticism from No New Jails NYC, a coalition of activists opposed to the construction of new detention facilities.

Brittany Williams, a No New Jails activist from Sunset Park, said she is skeptical of the city's authority to set the deadline because state officials may have to approve the closure of local jails. But the council said state approval is not needed as the jails are under the city's jurisdiction.

Williams also questioned the timing of the resolution's introduction so soon before the council is expected to vote on the plans for new jails this month.

"They wait one week before the vote to introduce this. Everyone should be really concerned," Williams said.

Some lawmakers also had reservations about the resolution Thursday. Council Member Barry Grodenchik said he didn't get a copy of it until 11:30 a.m., right before committee meeting started, and expressed doubts that the city can stick to its timeline.

"I am concerned, given the history of construction in the city of New York, that these jails as they are proposed will be finished by the end of 2026," said the Queens Democrat, who abstained from the vote with Council Member I. Daneek Miller.

Council Members Andy King and Chaim Deutsch both voted against the resolution. King said he wants to see how recent criminal-justice reforms play out before "we start putting jails in everybody's neighborhoods."

"I don’t see how closing Rikers corrects the system," King, a Bronx Democrat, said.