TESTIMONY
Jay Edidin, Director of Advocacy at the Women's Community Justice Association, on the Detrimental Impact of Mass Incarceration of Women and Gender Expansive People and the Necessity for Community-Based Alternatives
5:35:00
·
136 sec
Jay Edidin highlights the challenges faced by incarcerated women and gender expansive individuals at the Rose M. Singer Center on Rikers Island, emphasizing the need for alternatives to incarceration.
- Edidin points out that 1 in 5 inmates at the Rose M. Singer Center faces non-violent survival crimes and underscores the lack of access to necessary resources.
- 80% of the incarcerated population struggles with mental health issues, and many are primary caregivers, which exacerbates their vulnerabilities.
- Criticizes Mayor Adams' expansion plans for the Queensboro jail and his approach to mass incarceration, which ignores the rising rates of incarceration among women that are disproportionate to crime rates.
- Calls for the General Welfare Committee to resist mass incarceration strategies and prioritize community resources and alternatives to incarceration and detention.
Jay Edidin
5:35:00
Thank you, Deputy Speaker Ayala, members of the General Welfare Committee, both for the opportunity to testify today and for your fierce ongoing advocacy on behalf of the most vulnerable New York My name is Jay Edden, and I'm the director of advocacy at the Women's Community Justice Association.
5:35:15
As of last week, least 1 in 5 of the women and gender expensive people currently incarcerated that the Roseanne Singer Center on Rikers Island is unharassed.
5:35:23
1 in 5.
5:35:24
And the charges that that population faces are overwhelmingly for nonviolent survival crimes.
5:35:29
Crimes they would not have needed to even consider if they had access to resources to which every New Yorker, every human being has a fundamental right.
5:35:38
80%, that's 4 of every 5 of the people at RMSC, have some sort of mental health concern.
5:35:44
Nearly that many are primary caregivers.
5:35:46
Many of them have struggled to access adequate care in the community and would have been far better served by community based alternatives to detention and incarceration than by their current situation.
5:35:57
Ner atoms discusses mass incarceration as if it were in inevitability, a matter of simple math beyond his control.
5:36:03
And then in the same breath makes catastrophic cuts to community services into alternatives to incarceration and detention.
5:36:10
Some of you already know the Adams Administration's plan for the upcoming Queensboro jail more than triple the agreed upon number of beds for women and gender extensive people.
5:36:18
From 126 to 450.
5:36:21
This is happening at a time when vast incarceration of women is rising at an alarming rate, disproportionate to either the are raised in men or and this is the part that should make all of us especially angry, rate of criminal offense.
5:36:33
I call in this committee to resist to continue to resist that fear mongering.
5:36:37
To look at the actual crime statistics and the price human and financial of the city's embrace of mass incarceration, the destruction of lives and families, the waste of taxpayer dollars, and for what, uploaded inhumane and ultimately ineffective system.
5:36:51
Look at the women's community justice association and lipid conditions past 100 report, which offered simple, direct, and effective interventions to lower the population of women and gender expense of people caged by the city.
5:37:02
Look at the data on reoffense and how it differs between incarceration and ATI's.
5:37:07
Your Adams.
UNKNOWN
5:37:08
Thank you so much.
5:37:09
Your time has expired.
Jay Edidin
5:37:11
I called in the committee to prioritize community resources and the alternatives to incarceration.
5:37:15
And to raise this to crop this roll of Brojails.
