Proposition |
Opposition |
| Claim:
Closing Rikers Island can lower violence between inmates and correction officers. Warrant: The NY Times states about Rikers Island, “The Commission of Correction found that despite increased scrutiny from state and federal investigators in recent years, violent incidents have risen from 2016 to 2017, according to a report it released on Wednesday.” www.nytimes.com Rikers Island Correction Officers say, “slashings an stabbings are increasing.” “About 1,000 people die in American jails every year, and about a third of those are suicides.” www.npr.org “As one of the country’s most famous correctional facilities, Rikers has a reputation for violence of all kinds between prisoners and toward guards.” http://www.arrestrecords.com Impact: This will be safer for the people who work at theses jails and for the prisoners in them. If there were less people in a single jail facility, less harm will be done. 2. Claim: The overpopulation of Rikers Island will be solved. Warrant: “But Rikers is so overcrowded, just finding a bed for an inmate can be a problem.” www.cbsnews.com “Overcrowding in city jails reaches crisis levels, holding 7,900 men and women with a capacity for 4,200 by cramming two and sometimes three beds into a cell.” www.nydailynews.com “On an average day in 2017, there were a total of approximately 9,400 people incarcerated in city jails with space for just 2,300 people in existing facilities in the boroughs.” https://rikers.cityofnewyork.us Impact: Destroying the system of Rikers Island and creating smaller jails will solve the overpopulation. If there are more jails, more people can have suitable living conditions. 3. Claim: Inmate idle time will decrease. Warrant: Job training- “Approximately 80% of individuals in our custody will be home within a year.” Should Rikers Island Be Closed or Reformed? Education “[One of the main points of idle time] Designing effective inmate education opportunities and services to reduce idle time.” www.nyc.gov Impact: For 1, this is important because if 80% of Rikers Island population is home within a year, they need training for a job so they can support themselves and (possibly) their families. If they can earn money and be happy, they have no reason to end up in jail again. For 2, inmates need an education, so that they can be outside of jail, and able to survive in our advancing world. They need to be able to keep up with everybody else, no matter if they spent time in jail or not. Claim: Rikers is built on a landfill, which releases methane. Warrant: You can be exposed to methane by: “Breathing vehicle exhaust and emissions from farms, landfills, and use of fossil fuels.” https://toxtown.nlm.nih.gov Effects: “In big amounts and high concentrations, however, methane gas can be quite harmful. It has the ability to rid the body of oxygen which can cause asphyxiation, respiratory problems, as well as convulsions. If you are exposed to a medium concentration, you can experience nausea, vomiting, and in some cases even loss of consciousness. If you are exposed to a slightly lesser concentration of methane gas, you can experience rapid breathing, increased heart rate, dizziness and exhaustion.” www.doityourself.com “As methane builds in a room, it begins to take the place of oxygen. According to the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety, oxygen levels may decrease to a point where they represent less than 18 percent of the air in the room. When this happens, an occupant of the room may begin to feel slightly dizzy and experience a headache. At first, your heart rate may quicken and you may begin to have some loss of coordination. As levels of methane rise and oxygen levels are depleted, you may begin to feel fatigued, and have emotional upsets and trouble breathing. If not removed from the room, you may begin to get nauseous and be unable to move. Oxygen concentrations of 6 percent or lower can cause death. These effects may occur faster if you are exerting yourself in any way while the methane is filling the room. Carbon Monoxide If the methane produces carbon monoxide, you may begin to experience the symptoms associated with that type of poisoning. The first symptom you may feel is a dull pain in your head, almost like a sinus headache. As you breathe in more of the fumes, the headache may be followed by weakness and dizziness. This may lead to nausea and vomiting and a pain in your chest. If you continue to be exposed to carbon monoxide, your judgment may become impaired and you may get confused and irritable. Finally, you may experience a loss of consciousness, followed by death. Other Effects Other effects of exposure to methane gas can include damage to organ tissue from lack of oxygen. Also, in some people this type of gas can be a cardiac sensitizer. A cardiac sensitizer can ultimately cause an irregular heartbeat or sudden death, depending on the person. If you are exposed to too much carbon monoxide from methane, you may end up with permanent brain damage or the onset of cardiac complications later in life.” https://healthfully.com Impact: You can die from from this. It’s not something to be taken lightly, and removing Rikers is the way to do this. Refutations:
However, these people in Rikers Island aren’t guilty. They are not in prison, they are in jail, and as summarized by the constitution, “even the obviously guilty are treated as though they are innocent, until they are proven otherwise.”
No, because local prisons get 60% more funding than Rikers Island. They are funded enough that they will have maximum security Main Point: These prisoners are the ones being affected. We need this change to support them, while keeping civilians and corrections officers safe. Isiah, an inmate, says, "They use that place to break people." We, proposition, want to defend these people. Things to Keep in Mind: -The plan: “Our goal is a jail system that is smaller, safer, and fairer – one consistent with the overall criminal justice system we are building in New York City, in which crime continues to fall, the jail population drops significantly, and all New Yorkers are treated with dignity. Our newer system of jails will be focused on helping those incarcerated find a better path in life and maintain access to community supports. And it will ensure that officers have safer places to work and more support.” https://rikers.cityofnewyork.us Jail: “a place for the confinement of people accused or convicted of a crime” https://search.yahoo.com Prison: “a building in which people are legally held as a punishment for a crime they have committed or while awaiting trial” https://search.yahoo.com -These people in Rikers Island are not actually guilty. They are not in prison, they are in jail, and as summarized by the constitution, “even the obviously guilty are treated as though they are innocent, until they are proven otherwise.” Civilians agree “There is rare consensus among inmate advocates and correction officials that the surest way to fix the Rikers Island jail complex is to empty it.” www.nytimes.com -Rikers Island is built on a landfill: “Rikers is built on a landfill. The ground underneath the facilities is unstable and the decomposing garbage emits poisonous methane gas. In addition to extreme heat and poor air quality, flooding and crumbling infrastructure pose a serious threat, especially when superstorms like Hurricane Sandy strike.” https://grist.org/ -Rikers houses adolescents as well: “Robert N. Davoren Center Has a unit for 16 to 17 year-olds. The violence in the adolescent unit was the subject of a federal report written by U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara in 2014. Flooding has damaged the adolescents’ school, gym, and library.” https://grist.org/ |
Claim: Removing Rikers Island and creating smaller, more numerous jails is too expensive. Warrant: ”The number of inmates on Rikers Island has reached its lowest point in three decades — but the cost of housing each one has skyrocketed to $132,000 a year, a report found on Thursday.” www.qchron.com “Moreover, the city must take these costs into account before going ahead with any such plan.” www.qchron.com “...$10.1 billion, 20-year option that expanded or built new jails in four of the five boroughs...” https://www.nydailynews.com Economies of scale: “Economies of scale refer to reduced costs per unit that arise from increased total output of a product. For example, a larger factory will produce power hand tools at a lower unit price, and a larger medical system will reduce cost per medical procedure.” https://www.investopedia.com/ Impact: The cost of inmates without changing anything is already $132,000 a year. If you take down the Rikers Island jail facility, and create new jails, not only will it cost more money, it will be more expensive to maintain because of economies of scale. Claim: Civilians can be harmed from this plan. Warrant: Civilians disagree with this plan: “Brooklyn residents let New York City officials and their corporate partners know on Thursday that, rather than the expansion of the Brooklyn Detention Complex proposed as part of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s plan to shut down Rikers Island, they want “no new jails.”’ https://shadowproof.com Imagine, for a moment, how you would react if you were told that inmates from Rikers Island, one of the worst jails in America, were becoming your neighbors? Your neighborhoods crime rate may increase with the constant pressure of law-breaking nearby. Would you want your home to be corrupted? We doubt it, and that is why Rikers Island should remain open. Impact: This plan would just make things more uneasy within neighborhoods. In a society where there’s the constant presence of a jail, you can’t exactly be carefree. No one would want their children to play outside alone, because there’s a jail next door. It’s not fair to the people who live in the neighborhoods where jails are going to be placed. Claim: The problems would just be spread apart, not gone. Warrant: There are so many problems on Rikers. For example, according to www.nrp.com, “About 1,000 people die in American jails every year, and about a third of those are suicides.” This is a major issue, but will it be fixed if it’s spread out? No, there is no guarantee of this happening. Instead of getting rid of this fundamental jail system of Rikers Island, other steps can be taken, such as: renovating Rikers Island, adding heating and cooling systems, better medical care, more inmate awareness, etc. These will not only be more cost-efficient, they will keep civilians safe and help actually solve the problem, not spread it out. Impact: If you want to get rid of an ink stain on a piece of paper, you don’t spread it out, because that only makes the stain bigger. You don’t ignore it, either. WHat you can do is make sure that it doesn’t happen again, and that is by fixing Rikers Island itself. Refutations: Overpopulation will be solved. However, is it really worth it if people are harmed in the process? Civilians can and will be harmed in this process, and we need to prevent that. Also, Rikers is not actually overpopulated; there are 15000 places for inmates, only 9000 are filled. Additionally, as stated before, you need to fix the problem at its core, not spread it out. Main Point: The problems would just be spread apart, not gone. It’s not worth the money or the risk if the problem won’t be eliminated. It’s not worth it at all. Things to Keep in Mind: It has been done, and can be done again. Over 6 years, “the department achieved a 93 percent reduction of inmate-on-inmate violence (slashing and stabbings), a 72 percent reduction in serious use of force incidents, a 33 percent reduction in overtime spending, a 31 percent reduction in staff sick abuse, and a 48 percent reduction in assaults of staff. We increased our searches by 164 percent, which resulted in a 50 percent increase in weapons seized. Overtime spending plummeted from $112 million annually, to less than $50 million, and all this was accomplished at the same time that dozens of federal court-ordered consent decrees were eliminated through compliance.” www.cityandstateny.com |