Getting the ‘Renewable Rikers’ Vision Back on Track

Urban Matters: Michael, you helped write the recent ‘A Reset for Renewable Rikers’ study. At the outset, explain how Renewable Rikers came about, what its goals are, and why it needs a reset. 

Michael Higgins, Jr.: The Renewable Rikers campaign started as a follow-up to movement during the [Mayor Bill] de Blasio administration to close [the City’s corrections facilities on] Rikers. They made a formal commitment in 2017 to close the jails on the island in 10 years. That was legislated in the City Council in 2019 as the borough-based jail plan. [Editor’s note: The intended  borough-based replacement jails are now expected to open between 2029 and 2032.]

Then the question was: What do we do with the island? The Renewable Rikers campaign brought together criminal justice advocates supportive of closing the jails with advocates aware of the environmental burdens on many of the communities around Rikers Island. 

And there was a light bulb moment: a lot of communities of folks that have come to Rikers and a lot of communities that have been burdened by pollution and the siting of City facilities are the same communities, particularly when we're talking about the South Bronx. 

Renewable Rikers was this vision: Can we use these 400 acres in a useful way, thinking about restorative justice, closing this chapter of incarceration in a way that’s a benefit to the city?