Your guide to NYC's public proceedings.
Q&A
Comparison of voting rates between Rikers Island and general public
4:32:48
ยท
179 sec
Council Member Restler compares the voting rates of Rikers Island inmates to the general public, highlighting the disparity. BOE representatives attempt to contextualize the numbers within broader voting trends.
- Only about 8% of the Rikers Island population is voting
- This is significantly lower than the general public's voting rate in major elections
- BOE representatives argue that the return rate of absentee ballots from Rikers is similar to the general public
Lincoln Restler
4:32:48
Right.
4:32:48
I just think that we're talking about Gail said that population six Katz Muhammed Brewer mentioned the population 6,000.
4:32:54
It's actually 7,000 now.
4:32:56
We've seen a tremendous spike, 30% increase during Eric Adams administration in the number of people who are incarcerated.
4:33:02
And we're talking about 8% of that population is voting.
4:33:07
Right?
4:33:07
90 plus percent of it is a pretrial population, but only 8% of the population on the island is voting.
Vincent Ignizio
4:33:13
And I'm embarrassed to say that roughly mirrors what the public is doing outside of the confines of Rikers Island.
Lincoln Restler
4:33:20
But not in the not in the November election for president.
4:33:25
I think it was we had I mean, we had some of the worst
Michael Ryan
4:33:28
So, yeah.
4:33:29
So over 60%.
Lincoln Restler
4:33:32
Three million people voted.
4:33:35
So, I mean, if you depends what your denominator point
Michael Ryan
4:33:39
nine.
4:33:40
I mean, you know, that's what it
Lincoln Restler
4:33:41
You I mean, but if if you take out people 18 out of your 8,500,000 people, you're probably talking about half of the voting age population is voting.
4:33:49
You're talking about 8% of a Rikers population voting.
4:33:51
That those are radically different numbers.
4:33:54
Just to to to be consistent.
Vincent Ignizio
4:33:56
What we're charged with is ensuring that anybody who is eligible to vote has the ability to vote.
4:34:01
Whether they actually vote is
Lincoln Restler
4:34:04
I understand that.
4:34:04
It's just had we had a significant number of more people who completed registration forms or requested absentee ballots.
4:34:10
The fourteen twenty two number I gave was a combination of the two, and a small subset of those people who expressed interest actually voted, I'm sure because of the operational challenges.
4:34:19
Look, Rikers is a total hellhole.
4:34:21
They miss tens of thousands of health care appointments every year that people request and register.
4:34:26
So it's hard to get anything accomplished there.
4:34:28
I'm not saying that it's easy, but we have a lot more interest than it's actually manifesting itself in votes.
4:34:34
And we wanna make sure that people have the opportunity to vote wherever they are even if they're in jail.
Vincent Ignizio
4:34:38
Mister chairman, there's a lot more work to do, but we're we're proud of the progress we've made and we're happy to work with you and this committee in ensuring that more people are eligible.
Michael Ryan
4:34:46
And just to put one last point on that, the differentiation between absentee ballots issued and absentee ballots returned between Rikers Island and the and the general public population is not that far different.
4:35:00
I mean, even during COVID, we had close to eight hundred thousand, absentee ballot packages sent out, and we got 455,000 or 465,000 returned.
4:35:13
So we always see a drop off.
4:35:14
People request them, but they don't always they don't always return them.
4:35:19
I
Lincoln Restler
4:35:23
am disappointed by the analysis that we can't do a proper voting site replicating as chair as council member Brewer noted, the successful model you all have in nursing homes.
4:35:34
I do think that there are many ways that we could make voting more accessible to the to the the people who are there and we'd like to continue.
4:35:42
We appreciate you've been engaging with legal aid and other advocates on this, but there's a lot more that we can do.