NY Orders Prison Guards Back to Work as Gov. Hochul Considers Out-of-State Transfers

New York state troopers are serving court notices ordering corrections officers to end their unauthorized strike as the state considers transferring prisoners out of state, adding fuel to a prison policy debate that has followed lawmakers back to the Capitol.

State officials said Tuesday that nine out of 10 corrections officers have participated in the walkout. The strikers say chronic understaffing and an increase in contraband have made conditions inside correctional facilities more dangerous, while people incarcerated at the state’s prisons report that their own living conditions have deteriorated since staff walked off the job.

The strike has largely been motivated by the 2021 HALT law, which restricts the use of solitary confinement. The officers’ Republican allies in the state Legislature have launched unsuccessful attempts to repeal the law, which they say makes maintaining order in prisons more difficult. The Democratic majority hasn’t shown interest in repealing HALT, which they argue provides basic humane living standards for incarcerated people. Instead, they’ve pushed to alleviate the staffing crisis by closing more prisons, as Gov. Kathy Hochul proposed Thursday.
Senate Minority Leader Rob Ortt, a Republican from Niagara County, blamed Democratic policies for the current crisis.

“This is the culmination or the result of years of demonizing our corrections officers, of understaffing our prisons, of closing our prisons, of making it easier for contraband to get into our prisons, making corrections officers’ lives and safety less safe,” he said Monday.

State corrections department spokesperson Tom Mailey said that officers who fail to show up for their shifts – which is illegal under state law – will lose their pay and health insurance while on strike.

GOP senators met with more than a dozen relatives of striking officers on Monday.

Bernadette Singer, whose husband works at the Collins Correctional Facility in Erie County, said she was undeterred by the corrections department’s latest moves.

“We are not going to be bullied into submission,” she said. “We’re not going to give up this fight. We are going to continue to hold the line. We will talk to every senator. We will knock on every single door. It’s not going to stop.”

Singer and Ortt said they didn’t know how long the wildcat strike – a work stoppage not authorized by the union leadership – would last. Family members of the striking officers returned to the Capitol on Tuesday.

Hochul said at a morning event that the state will consider alternative holding facilities – including out-of-state transfers. She deployed the National Guard to prisons around the state last week.

“Let me be clear: the illegal actions being taken by a number of individuals is putting the entire state at risk,” the Democratic governor said. “We need them back to work. This must end immediately.”

Last week, two incarcerated men told Gothamist that they were unable to leave their cells or access hot meals as a result of the wildcat strike. A man at the Auburn Correctional Facility died in his cell over the weekend, multiple outlets reported. The public defender group representing him blamed medical neglect because of the wildcat strike, though it was not yet clear if the prison’s staffing level factored in his death.

Mediated talks between the state corrections department and the and the officers’ union officers, started Monday. Union spokesperson James Miller said there were extensive discussions that included the HALT law, restrictions on triple shifts and allowing striking officers to return to their posts without discipline.
Mailey, the corrections department spokesperson, didn’t return a message seeking comment on Tuesday. On Monday he said talks were ongoing.
Back at the Capitol, state Sen. Dan Stec, a Republican from Warren County, offered a hostile amendment – a forced vote on an unrelated bill – that would repeal the HALT law. It was voted down Monday along party lines.

Nearby, a half-dozen advocates for incarcerated people chanted “Don’t roll back HALT, the guards are at fault.” One of them was Anthony Dixon, who was incarcerated for more than three decades.
Dixon fought for the HALT law, which limits the amount of time an incarcerated person can spend in isolation. It also mandates at least four hours of out-of-cell time per day and requires a hearing before someone is segregated into solitary confinement.

He criticized Hochul, a Democrat, for suspending provisions of the law last week. Solitary confinement is akin to torture, he said.
“ You wouldn’t treat an animal this way,” Dixon said. “ We are negotiating with terrorists.”

Democrats who control the state Legislature said they plan to focus on reform of the prison system this year in light of the beating death of Robert Brooks, who was incarcerated at the Marcy Correctional Facility near Utica.

Video footage shows prison staff punching and kicking Brooks while he is handcuffed in the infirmary. He later died at a hospital. A special prosecutor charged 10 prison employees in connection with the death, including six men who were charged with murder. They’ve pleaded not guilty.

Some progressive legislators have called on the state to close the Marcy prison. On Thursday, Hochul proposed allowing the state to close up to five facilities to make staffing them more efficient and manageable. Hochul has cited a declining incarcerated population in the state, and her administration closed two prisons last year.
This year’s legislation doesn’t specify which facilities could close.

Story By Jimmy Vielkind/WNYC/New York Public News Network
Link: https://gothamist.com/news/ny-prison-strike-ordered-back-to-work-transfers

Image: State Senate Minority Leader Robert Ortt with the families of striking officers in Albany. (Credit: Jimmy Vielkind)