Close youth prisons, invest in better rehabilitation options
Guilderland grad helps Daemen to first-ever Elite Eight appearance
New York is at a crossroads. For over a decade, too many leaders ignored the exorbitant costs of youth incarceration. In 2018, the annual cost of incarcerating a young person in New York was nearly $900,000 — more than triple what it was a decade ago — according to our 2020 report, Sticker Shock.
Facing severe budget challenges, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and agency heads are seeking savings. They identified four facilities with a combined 50 youth and
▶ Marc Schindler is executive director of the Justice Policy Institute and former interim director of Washington, D.C.’S Department of Youth Rehabilitation Services. Jeremy Kittridge is JPI’S research and policy associate.
proposed merging operations and closing two youth prisons to save $22 million a year, and another $14 million in capital investments. We applaud the governor’s decision. Though upstate legislators, and correctional officer unions concerned about jobs, are protesting, this is the right move and will result in a fairer and more effective youth justice system.
The rapid increase in the cost of locking up youth in New York has been driven, to some degree, by the success of recent reforms. Over the past decade, stakeholders pushed New York leadership to reform the youth justice system, resulting in a dramatic decrease in the incarcerated
population. Reforms included New York’s Close to Home Initiative, which removed most of New York City’s incarcerated youth from large, dangerous facilities to serve them primarily in community-based programs and, when needed, smaller home-like facilities closer to their families and communities. It’s time for the state to address its own challenges and be a national leader.
Research has found that youth crime in New York City dropped by half after this initiative started, and that it advanced education and employment outcomes. Though this dramatic shift is encouraging, nearly 85 percent of the state’s remaining confined youth are youth of color. Costly facilities, many of which are nearly empty, remain open, continuing the ineffective and disparate confinement of Black and brown youth.
The research is clear. Youth incarceration is racist and has a substantial negative impact on recidivism, education, and potential for employment. Imprisonment increases the probability of recidivism as an adult by more than 20 percent. A study of 9,000 youth found that only one in five formerly incarcerated youth graduated high school, translating into diminished employment prospects; another study found a significant reduction in wages and number of weeks worked by their 40th birthday. These findings only worsen for youth of color; Black, Native American, and Latinx youth are incarcerated at five, three, and nearly two times the rate of white youth, respectively.
New York wasted millions of dollars staffing and operating sparsely populated youth prisons. The population has dropped precipitously but, until recently, state leadership has lacked the political will to close facilities and reinvest those savings in proven interventions that can more equitably and effectively address youth violence.
When the youth justice system focuses its funding on incarceration and warehousing — rather than investing in — youth, the costs go beyond budgets.
Youth prisons are not part of a datadriven public safety strategy.
If New York is serious about improving youth outcomes, it must focus on closing all remaining large youth prisons and redirecting the savings to evidence-based, small, local and community-based options. Reallocating resources to support education, employment opportunities, and public health services will help stabilize communities and improve outcomes for youth, their families, and the community.
As New York approaches $1 million per year per youth in some of its facilities, it is long past time to act. New York must abandon the failed practices of youth incarceration and take this opportunity to reimagine a system of small, local and evidence-based services and supports that genuinely meet the needs of justice-involved youth and their communities.
The Sischo kid is going to the Elite Eight.
Guilderland High graduate Andrew Sischo had 25 points and 13 rebounds Tuesday night to lift Daemen College to a 71-70 victory over St. Thomas Aquinas College in the NCAA Division II basketball regional final at Albany
Capital Center.
The victory sends Daemen, located in the Buffalo suburb of Amherst, to the NCAA’S Elite Eight for the first time. The eight regional winners in Division II will convene March 24-27 in Evansville, Ind.
“To play against STAC in the hometown and win it in this great arena is something I’m going to remember forever,” Sischo said.
Sischo, a 6-foot-9 senior center, already has gaudy career totals of 2,194 points and 1,085 rebounds in a four-year career, which he plans to continue next season because of the NCAA rule allowing 2020-21 winter sports athletes an extra year of eligibility.
He now has helped his school make its first appearance in the national finals. In fact, Daemen had never won an NCAA Tournament game until Sunday night, when the Wildcats beat Bloomfield, N.J., 81-69 in the semifinals.
“I look at all the different guys who contributed,” Daemen coach Mike Macdonald said. “Kyle Harris at the beginning of the
second half was tremendous. Sean Fasoyiro made some dribble plays where he set Andrew up for shots, and it helps when you have the best player in the country, which we do.”
In a game that had 13 lead changes and three ties, Sischo converted a three-point play with 1:46 to go to give Daemen (10-5) the lead for good, 67-65, part of a 9-0 run as the Wildcats overcame a five-point deficit with 4:45 to play.
Sischo scored Daemen’s final seven points, including a clinching free throw with 3.6 seconds to play to make it 71-67. STAC’S Grant Singleton canned a 3pointer with 0.7 seconds left, but a successful inbounds wrapped up the victory.
“He’s a true first-team Allamerica center,” Aquinas coach Tobin Anderson said. “He caused a lot of problems for us.”
The two East Coast Conference
rivals were playing for the fourth time this season. Daemen had handed STAC, located in Rockland County, its only previous loss, but the Spartans had won the past two. Aquinas has been invited to the NCAA Division II tournament each of the past six years.
“Everybody who plays wants to have the ball in their hands at the end,” Sischo said. “To be able to do it in the hometown, in this instance, have the trust of my guys in me is something I would never take for granted. Every one of those guys trusted me with the ball, and I trust every single one of them.”
The Spartans (14-2) got off to an early 8-0 lead. They did a good job of fronting Sischo, who didn’t get his first points until 9:39 had elapsed, but they got burned from the outside.
Daemen hung in and eventually took a 37-34 lead by making six of nine 3-point shots in the first half.
“In the first half, the kid (Andrew) Mason made 3-for-3 from
three, then (Kyle) Harris was 3-for-4,” Anderson said. “So that’s six threes right there, so we couldn’t leave those guys. That’s a well put-together team because they’ve got great shooters, and if you help on Sischo, they’re going to kick it out and make threes. If you don’t help on Sischo, he’s going to score.”
Sischo’s final numbers: 9-of-14 from the floor, 7-of-11 from the foul line, two assists and nine fouls drawn.
“Nobody can take from us that we’re champions now,” Sischo said. “Who would have thought that we’d have guys opting out (nine total) at different times of the year, that I would sit here with the net around my neck and a trophy. It’s awesome, and it shows the testament of the great coaching that coach Mac put in, and the time and effort that everyone put in to get themselves better.”
Jutta and Greg Reilly of Albany offered up this photo for St. Patrick’s Day: their dog Guinness (now deceased) taken on a recent St Patrick’s Day. “Guinness was a mellow, wonderful dog and we miss him still,” the Reillys said.
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