{"id":162906,"date":"2025-08-21T04:38:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-21T04:38:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/162906\/"},"modified":"2025-08-21T04:38:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T04:38:10","slug":"bill-would-allow-incarceration-to-count-toward-supportive-housing-eligibility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/162906\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill would allow incarceration to count toward supportive housing eligibility"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jail is not a home, but incarceration prevents people from qualifying for city-funded supportive housing, which requires a recent track record of homelessness. For this reason, the City Council passed a bill<\/a> on August 14 considering time spent in prison, jail, or court-mandated medical detention to count toward time unhoused when meeting the qualifying threshold if the individual was homeless before entering custody and would remain homeless after release. <\/p>\n

If signed into law, the legislation, known as Int. 1100, would allow someone incarcerated for 12 or more consecutive months and facing homelessness on release to qualify for supportive housing. City Councilmember Carlina Rivera sponsored the bill, which she highlighted at a press conference as one of her last major projects before she leaves office.<\/p>\n

\u201cNearly 70% of people on Rikers [Island] who could benefit from supportive housing are shut out because of the chronic homelessness definition,\u201d said Rivera. \u201cIt costs over $500,000 a year to incarcerate them, but supportive housing saves public dollars and it changes lives. We have a responsibility to recognize incarceration as a form of housing instability [and] remove systemic barriers that keep people trapped in the vicious cycle of jail and homelessness and back again.\u201d<\/p>\n

The city\u2019s supportive housing model offers people experiencing homelessness low-cost apartments, tied in with social services like mental healthcare and addiction treatment. Formerly incarcerated individuals are nearly 10 times more likely to be unhoused, with women and people of color facing even higher rates, according to a 2018 Prison Policy Initiative report<\/a>. More than half the population on Rikers Island receives some form of mental health treatment<\/a>. <\/p>\n

As a result, policies criminalizing homelessness lead to a \u201crevolving door\u201d with incarcerated people facing re-arrest due to low-level \u201cquality of life\u201d offenses like public urination or aggressive panhandling. Last year, the Supreme Court\u2019s Grants Pass ruling<\/a> set case law toward allowing cities to arrest people for sleeping outside. <\/p>\n

Last year, the Independent Budget Office<\/a> found roughly one-third of the jail population in 2023 experienced homelessness or housing instability during a current or previous detainment. <\/p>\n

Int. 1100 proponents say supportive housing will interrupt the \u201crevolving door\u201d cycle by not only preventing homelessness but addressing mental health and substance use among formerly incarcerated individuals. <\/p>\n

Rivera estimates that around 2,600 people held on Rikers Island each year could benefit from her legislation and it would cost roughly $108 million to place them in supportive housing, as opposed to $1.4 billion to incarcerate them. <\/p>\n

Supportive housing resident Helen Taylor spent her birthday at the press conference recounting how an apartment from service provider Fortune Society saved her life after incarceration and championed Int. 1100 in hopes that her story would not be so unique.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving my apartment \u2014 the very first apartment I have ever had in my life \u2014 has made a difference in my life today,\u201d said Taylor. \u201cIt\u2019s a step closer to fulfilling my mission to a better life. It\u2019s not just a place to live; it\u2019s a tremendous amount of support \u2026 I am part of a community: There are people that check on me; my birthdays are celebrated; when I had COVID, people went out and bought me groceries. Plus they have done so much more.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Living] in my apartment [and] working with such wonderful people at the Fortune Society allowed me to go from \u2026 sleeping in parks to performing \u2018Shakespeare in the Park\u2019 at the Delacourt Theater in Central Park.\u201d<\/p>\n

Elected officials like Public Advocate Jumaane Williams; City Comptroller Brad Lander; and Council Members Alexa Aviles, Althea Stevens, and Lincoln Restler also came out to support the bill. <\/p>\n

\u201cJail is not a home for anyone at any point in time, so we are here to challenge this country\u2019s addiction to mass incarceration and profiting over putting Black and Brown bodies in jail for profit,\u201d said Aviles.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we\u2019re in a time where we see [in] other cities, the \u2018Orange Man\u2019 criminalizing<\/a> homelessness, this bill is a symbol that New York will not stand for that,\u201d added Stevens.<\/p>\n

Shortly after the press conference, Rivera confirmed she would step down from office before she terms out this winter, as first reported by Politico<\/a>. <\/p>\n

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