Tuesday, February 16, 2016
Cuomo Offers Support for Mark-Viverito’s Call to Close Rikers
Gov. Andrew Cuomo voiced support Sunday for New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito’s call to close Rikers Island.
Calling the idea offered by the speaker during her State of the City speech last week “interesting and intriguing,” Cuomo said the island jail was a dated facility, and that the smaller, more technically advanced jails that can be built today would be “more appropriate.”
“You could design a facility that would be much easier to operate for the correction officials and it would be safer for the inmates, Cuomo told reporters after a church service in Harlem. “We had a federal investigation for civil rights violations, and it is a truly troubled facility and I believe the design of it is one of the aggravating factors.”
The Governor said Rikers has been a “big problem” for for some time and described Mark-Viverito’s call to close it as a “big solution”...