NYC NOW - April 4, 2024: Evening Roundup

Episode Date: April 4, 2024

The union representing jail guards in New York City is ratcheting up its opposition to a federal takeover of Rikers Island. Plus, a group of New Yorkers want pro skater Tony Hawk to abandon plans to build a skatepark in Central Brooklyn. WNYC’s Ramsey Khalifeh has more. Finally, WNYC has been reporting on the more than 700 lawsuits recently filed by former Rikers Island detainees who allege sexual assault by correction officers. But how did these allegations go unchecked by a federal monitor who has had oversight of the jails for the last 8 years? WNYC reporter Matt Katz has some answers

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. I'm Jene Pierre. Only a quarter of the garbage New Yorkers throw out is actually trash. That's according to a new sanitation department study that sorted through samples of the waste it collects during two periods last year. It says 75% of what goes in landfills can be diverted. A third of the things thrown out were actually compostable organic matter. DSNY, Executive Director of Policy and Planning, Francesca Haas, says curbside organics collection has the potential to significantly reduce landfill waste.

The snapshot of how much organics is currently in the refuse stream in particular shows us the enormous potential that curbside organics diversion has and as well the importance of the path that we're on to rolling out curbside organics to the rest of New York City. The mayor has said his administration will expand curbside composting to all Five Burrows by October. A group of New Yorkers want pro skater Tony Hawk to abandon plans to build a skate park in central Brooklyn, and they say they'll make their point using music. WMYC's Ramsey Caliphé has more.

When Tony Hawk takes the stage for a scheduled appearance at the Beacon Theater tonight, a different kind of performance will be taking place outside. Tony Hawk can save our park, save our green space now. Skate Park Project holds the key. Stop the paving now with your lobby. That's the song Haley Gorenberg says she and a group of Brooklyn residents will sing outside the theater. Gornberg is the co-chair of the Friends of Mount Prospect Park. That's a small park located across Flatbush Avenue from its bigger, more famous neighbor.

The group formed in February to stop the city from building the Brooklyn Skate Garden there. The 40,000 square foot skate park would be one of the biggest on the East Coast. Gornberg's group says not so fast. We know we have a climate crisis. We know green space is important for our well-being. We know it's important for our future, for our kids' future, for skating kids' future. The park is being designed and built by the Skateboard Project, which was founded by Hawk in 2002 to build skate parks in underserved communities. The nonprofit says they'll plant more trees as a part of the project, which will be built in an underused part of the eight-acre park.

Aaron Aniton is a volunteer at the Skateboard Project. He's confused by the opposition. It's just people who are just, they're either totally against skateboarding. They don't understand skateboarding. I don't understand what their general issue is. He could maybe find some answers outside the Beacon Theater event, where Hawk is scheduled to discuss his groundbreaking career with another skateboarding pioneer, Rodney Muller.

Skate Park Project, leave the way. Stop the paving now. Supporters of the park say the design is still in the early stages. In a statement, Hawk encouraged all the way. parties to work together and, quote, keep the community a priority. That's WMYC's Ramsey Caliphate. Up next, over 700 lawsuits alleged sexual assault on Rikers Island by former detainees. But how did these allegations go left unchecked so long?

That story after the break. WMYC has been reporting on the more than 700 lawsuits recently filed by former Rikers Island detainees who allege sexual assault by correction officers. But how did these allegations go unchecked by a federal monitor who has had oversight of the jails for the last eight years? My colleague Michael Hill spoke with public safety reporter Matt Hatt. to get some answers. Matt, let's start with our investigation into these lawsuits. There are 719 in all recently filed against the city and the Department of Correction under the

Adult Survivors Act. Matt, what has the reaction been to this reporting? Yeah, elected officials said they were surprised to see the extent of these claims. The mayor called for an investigation. City Council promised a hearing. So the Adult Survivors Act, it gave sexual assault survivors a one-year. window to file lawsuits beyond the statute of limitations. And even though this new law was not written to address rape behind bars, most of the lawsuits filed in New York City dealt with people who

alleged they were sexually assaulted in city jails. Victims are seeking more than $14 billion in all. In their suits, they describe situations where correction officers sexually assaulted them and jail officials knew what was going on and allowed this to continue. Man, as I said at the top, Rikers has been overseen by a federal monitor for years. You've been reporting on this since 2016. What has he had to say about this alleged pattern of sexual assault? Fair question, because the city has spent about $20 million so far on this monitor, Steve Martin and his team, and he does not talk to the press. So all he could do was review the dozens of reports that he's issued to a federal judge through the years. And it's fair to wonder whether this was ever even on his radar, given that taxpayers paid for his oversight and now could be on the hook for billions of dollars from these lawsuits from the alleged victims.

The bottom line is the monitor has never fully investigated or reported on rape alleged to have taken place in these jails by correctioned officers. And that's because the initial legal settlement that led to his appointment was specifically focused on two things, reducing officers. use of force in dealing with detainees, like hits to the head, things like that, and improving the treatment of teenage detainees. So while the monitor has meticulously documented statistics in those areas, and we know that since he's been there, most rates of violence in the jails by his own measures have actually worsened, we don't have any good numbers on allegations of sexual assault. It's because of this quirk in the original legal settlement that installed the monitor. The settlement said the monitor was empowered to only

address allegations of sexual assault on teenage detainees, younger than 19, because the belief at the time was young people's lives were particularly at risk at Rikers. And so when it comes to sexual assault, that's been his narrow focus ever since, just on teenage victims, not on anybody over the age of 18. So since the federal monitor was focused on allegations involving younger detainees, what did he find? He found that the Department of Correction grossly mishandled the investigations from the end of 2015 until 2016, the monitor reported on 17 sexual abuse allegations made by young detainees against officers, and he excoriated the Department of Correction for how those cases were handled. He wrote that none were investigated by

department staff within the required 60 days, and investigators failed to interview witnesses, fail to ask key follow-up questions, failed to collect evidence. One Department of Correction Investigator even cited an alleged victim's positive drug test as a reason to discount their claims, which the monitor found appalling because that's not a valid reason for dismissing a claim of any sort. But by 2018, though, there was this big change at Rikers. The state passed a law is called Raise the Age, and it led all 16 and 17-year-old detainees to be moved out of Rikers and into youth facilities. So because the initial legal settlement that brought in the state, it was a lot of the monitor only addressed sexual abuse for those in the jails under the age of 19.

Ever since, the monitor has only examined complaints of those exactly 18 years old because there's no more 16 and 17-year-olds there. And the monitor reported zero allegations of sexual abuse among this very narrow group in 2020 and 2021. So in other words, over time, the monitor has only focused less on sexual assault. Yeah, that's right. Now there was nothing in the legal settlement that it could have stopped the monitor from reviewing how rape allegations were investigated by the Department of Correction because the monitor's scope from the initial mission he was given in 2016 until now has expanded in other ways. He now reports on fires and suicides, for example, but he has never looked at sexual assault of those older than 18.

There's now a belief that the city, despite the monitor's involvement, has fell to reform its jails during the years that the monitor has been there, so more intervention is needed. that's the argument and that a federal receiver should be appointed to take control of jail operations away from the city. This is someone who would literally replace the mayor as the person in charge of the jails. And that's a proposal that a judge is now considering the city opposes this. But I spoke to Marilyn Whirlwas. She's an attorney with the Legal Aid Society who filed the initial lawsuit that led to the monitor. And she said that if the city and the Department of Correction had actually succeeded in improving

life at Rikers, then there would have been a reduction in sexual assault because staff's supervision would have been better, accountability would have improved, and there wouldn't be what she described as an impunity for misconduct in all aspects of staff brutality. That's my colleague Michael Hill in conversation with public safety reporter Madcats. To hear our continued reporting on the allegations of rape and sexual assault at Rikers Island, check out our news site, Got the Mist. Thanks for listening to NYC Now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day.

I'm Junae Pierre. We'll be back tomorrow.