Inmates Coming Back to the House of D Next Month
The Department of Corrections says it will start putting inmates into the House of Detention on Atlantic and Smith next month, according to the Daily News, and eventually fill all 759 of the facility’s beds over the coming year. According to the story, the inmates will be pretrial prisoners who have court dates in Brooklyn…
The Department of Corrections says it will start putting inmates into the House of Detention on Atlantic and Smith next month, according to the Daily News, and eventually fill all 759 of the facility’s beds over the coming year. According to the story, the inmates will be pretrial prisoners who have court dates in Brooklyn and Staten Island. The jail basically stopped hosting inmates in 2003, and some neighborhood residents are less than thrilled about the HOD’s reopening: “Howard Kolins, president of the Boerum Hill Association and a member of the house of detention’s community advisory committee, said that when the jail was open, it brought visitors ditching contraband in the street, vehicles parking in bus stops and handicapped spots, and shackled prisoners being transported through residential streets. ‘Residents of State Street with small children are unnerved by that,’ he said.” A few years ago a bunch of different schemes for the building that came to nothing were bandied about, including ones that involved getting a developer to build retail and expanding the jail facilities. It remains to be seen whether simply bringing inmates back will have an effect on residents’ quality of life.
Inmates to Fill Reopened Brooklyn House of Detention in Boerum Hill [NY Daily News] GMAP
Photo by JayeClaire.
Not 10-12 Million – The renovation was in the area of 75-100M (originally projected at $50M)
That’s right. they closed it to renovate it but the renovation was a waste of time and money and they could not figure out how to re-open it. The community expressed its desires pro and con but had no real say in whether the facility re-opened or not. One thing is clear, all the money spent was a boondoggle and I doubt this facility will ever hold more than just a few inmates because it does not function well as a modern detention facility.
there must be a reason why the building has been empty for so many years. It’s not the nearby residents fault. It is the building itself, which is designed in a weird manner inside, it is completely obsolete and the guards don’t want to work there because they feel they are at risk.
Well MM that isnt entirely true – there were complaints at least 20years ago about unruly behavior by people waiting to go in to visit prisoners and also prisoners harassing pedestrians and such from a fenced rec area…but I agree it wasn’t a major issue. (and certainly not one worth keeping a facility worth hundreds of millions of dollars sitting empty)
Another factor that should be considered by the city (and opponents as well) is that the main courthouse has been moved down Jay St (the Courthouse next door is only used for arraignments I believe) – therefore prisoner transfers to the courthouse (in Brooklyn) must still be done by bus. The only reason why I mention this is because it may ultimately make sense to open a facility on less valuable RE (in a less populated area) and the city could then profit from the appreciation in their DTB land. But again, there is no fiscally (or socially) responsible way this facility (recently upgraded for $100M) should sit unused.
For a while there was an issue with the Correction Officers Union about the building’s unsafe design. Unsafe for the officers that is. Modern facilities are probably very different.
sorry noladarling – real White Collar/Wall St Crimes are prosecuted by the Feds – you’ll have to go to MDC on the Sunset Park Waterfront for those guys and besides they almost always make bail (ankle bracelet) so they dont need jail cells at all.
This isnt a prison – its a jail – that is totally different
Jails hold:
people awaiting trial (i.e. presumed innocent) – who cant make bail, or arent offered bail (like murder suspect) are housed in jails
misdemeanor offenders serving less than 1 yr and
occasionally felony convicts who are brought downstate for Court hearings and other proceedings.
Prisons hold convicted felons
As to this new development – I think it makes sense. If the community could show that another nearby location (has to be nearby to be practical) could work and be more cost effective (i.e selling current HOD in favor of lower cost (acquisition, retrofit, and operation) alternative – then sure, that would be better. But I am opposed to 1. letting a recently upgraded facility sit empty costing taxpayers a fortune to mothball or 2. ridiculous plans to sink more taxpayer money into upgrading, or changing existing facility after 100M of recent taxpayer money has yet to be amortized 1 cent.
are these “residents on state street” the ones from the 14 townhouses? i’ll bet on it.