For a safer NYC, save this program
As New York City’s elected district attorneys, we want each arrest to be a person’s last. While we recognize an arrest can be traumatic, experience teaches us it can also be an opportunity for meaningful intervention — one that equips individuals with the tools they need to identify and change behaviors. We believe passionately in these kinds of second chances because they make our communities safer while honoring the human dignity of those affected.
That’s why, earlier this month, we urged Mayor de Blasio and other city leaders to prioritize the citywide continuation of Project Reset, a critical pre-arraignment diversion program that has helped more than 4,500 people charged with low-level offenses obtain second chances and meaningful interventions, rather than entering the criminal justice system and suffering long-lasting collateral consequences.
Despite Project Reset’s important role in our city’s justice reform and jail reduction strategies, it will soon cease to exist unless the city renews funding. The financial cost of continuing this program, while not insignificant in today’s economic climate, pales in comparison to the savings it offers in improved court efficiency, faster case processing times and, most importantly, reduced misdemeanor convictions, which disproportionately impede people of color from obtaining employment, education and housing.
In this moment of crisis when our city and justice system are contending with an unprecedented pandemic, centuries-old systemic racism and an increase in gun violence, we simply cannot afford to let this vital program end now.
This summer, during sustained protests of police violence and racial inequality, New Yorkers demanded a fairer and more equitable justice system for all who call our city home. Project Reset’s emphasis on providing New Yorkers accused of low-level offenses with essential resources and opportunities to learn from past mistakes — rather than punitive approaches — is precisely the approach called for, in this moment, from law enforcement and our courts. The financial support of the City Council, along with the Manhattan district attorney’s office, made these life-changing outcomes possible for thousands, without compromising public safety. Now, we call upon the city to keep its commitment to our residents, our neighborhoods and our communities by continuing to fund Project Reset.
From its earliest days as a pilot program tailored to young adults in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx, Project Reset has demonstrated that an individual’s interaction with the justice system can present an opportunity for a transformative intervention that encourages self-reflection, restoration of self and community, and a reset of values and intentions for the future. We’re proud that this program, which was developed and embraced by prosecutors, police, public defenders and local service providers, has retained this guiding philosophy in recent years while subsequently expanding to serve all ages and all boroughs.
Contrary to a typical, involuntary criminal justice outcome, Project Reset participants are not ordered to attend. They voluntarily opt in, arrange their schedule to participate and show up to sessions, which vary by borough according to need and vision. Participants share within a group how their behavior affected others, acknowledge the voluntariness of actions, discuss steps for making amends, and changes they can make to avoid repeating the behavior. By contrast, traditional sentencings offer fewer opportunities for accountability upfront, and little if any opportunity for personal growth and healing. Their long-term consequences can be quite severe too.
People convicted of a crime can expect to earn at least 16% less, on average, than their peers, according to a new report from the Brennan Center for Justice. By avoiding a criminal conviction, Project Reset participants are able to pursue a living without barriers they would otherwise face. Early studies show this model reduces recidivism and inspires strong buy-in from participants (i.e., Brooklyn’s 93% completion rate).
These encouraging findings highlight not only the program’s value to New Yorkers charged with low-level offenses but also the value to our court system. As our offices work to close a pandemic-related case backlog, we need options like Project Reset to shift low-level cases away from the criminal justice system and, in turn, focus our time and attention on more pressing public safety matters such as violent crime.
Project Reset supplies us, as prosecutors, with a much-needed framework to successfully carry out our public safety mission while also promoting justice and healing. And it empowers our fellow New Yorkers, who deserve alternatives to incarceration, to pursue brighter futures unencumbered by their past mistakes. It would be a shame for our city to throw a second chance like this away.
Words matter
Anacortes, Wash.: In regards to your article about the brothers who “had sex” with their sister (“Amish brothers who pled guilty to having sex with pregnant 13-year-old sister avoid jail time,” Sept. 23), sex with 13-year-old girls is the felony of statutory rape. Her brothers repeatedly raped her. Please stop framing rape as sex. It isn’t, and you are contributing to the propagation of rape culture by framing it as such.
No-shows
Astoria: Voicer Bill Calvo asks how Bill de Blasio got reelected. The simple answer is low voter turnout. Of roughly 8.5 million New Yorkers, just over 5 million were registered voters. Of those voters, just over 1 million turned out to vote in 2017 and just over 700,000 voted for de Blasio. The numbers were similar in 2013. Hardly mandates either year. Elections have consequences, especially when people don’t show up. As for Schools Chancellor Richard Carranza, he was appointed by de Blasio, so there you go.
Paula Valentini
Doomed room
Emily McNeil
Staten Island: The MTA inspector general has discovered a room below the train tracks at Grand Central Terminal that was called a man cave. It seems that this room was put together by three Metro-North employees. Now the MTA will castigate those employees. Two workers have been suspended without pay. The MTA is considering termination. I say no way! The workers should have gotten permission, but to terminate them is totally unacceptable. Suspend without pay or take away vacation days — okay.
For an offense that did not harm anybody, termination is not okay! Bosses, rethink the punishment.
Font flop
Hazlet, N.J.: I go from one page to the next and see different fonts. Please keep the font and size you have on page 2 of the Sept. 24 paper and get rid of the font and size you have on page 3 of the same edition of the newspaper. It may just be font size, but it is a shame that you don’t have someone correcting these issues! Tanya Moore
License to kill
Plainview, L.I.: Donald Trump once bragged that he could shoot somebody in the middle of Fifth Ave. and not lose any voters. Today he could even more accurately say that cops can shoot Breonna Taylor in the middle of her apartment and not lose their jobs, their freedom or their own lives.
Richard Siegelman
Switch it up
Brooklyn: We have to stop this madness every time a ruling comes down. From now on, send only Black police officers to cover police calls involving Black people. This idea has been pooh-poohed for years. Nothing else is working. It can’t hurt.
Diane Hunt
Harbinger of chaos
Swarthmore, Pa.: When asked on Wednesday if he would accept the results of the election and a free and peaceful transition of power, President Trump’s response should chill the heart of every American. Not with a whisper, but with a bullhorn, he is telling us that he will use any means possible to retain power. Might he do the unthinkable and even order mail-in ballots not yet counted on Election Day impounded? Yes, he might, as Donald Trump is maniacally driven to retain power. He knows that not only is his political survival at stake but so is the survival of a viable Trump Organization, and even his freedom from future criminal conviction and potential incarceration. Trump is truly desperate, beyond normal comprehension, and this makes any possibility thinkable. Ken Derow
Public playbook
Oceanside, L.I.: I completely understand why President Trump and the Republicans are pushing through Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s replacement so quickly after her death. For Democrats to think they wouldn’t do it if the tables were turned is nothing short of ignorant. (Disclaimer: I’m a Democrat who cannot believe Joe Biden couldn’t do a better job than Trump by simply showing up occasionally.) While I believe the Republican senators’ motives are ideologically based, i.e., abortion, Obamacare, etc., Trump has made it crystal clear that his reasoning is simply to try and ensure his reelection. He has been setting the stage for his “rigged” election, and his strategy to try and overturn the results he clearly fears is the most transparent thing he has done since he avoided showing his tax returns. And if he loses, he will rally his sycophants to lead us to an even darker place that I fear we may be headed to.
Warren Meyer
Quite white
Queens Village: It was a little shocking to see that the law clerks, perhaps more 100 of them, hired by Ruth Bader Ginsburg were so completely non-diverse. What happened? Frank Barnett
Save the sanctimony
Hicksville, L.I.: No, Voicer Steven Malichek, I did not miss your point. I find it interesting how conservatives always talk about how they want judges who do not legislate from the bench. One of the most egregious cases of legislating from the bench is the Roberts Court ruling in Shelby County vs. Holder, which ended the pre-clearance portion of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. This was a law that was overwhelmingly passed by Congress. The ink was barely dry when Southern states previously subject to pre-clearance began enacting restrictive voting laws. Consider that in Texas, a valid form of ID is a gun license but not a student ID. Joe Squerciati
Opposition voter
Brentwood, L.I.: To Voicer Bill McConnell: 99% of your response to my letter was anti-Trump and if you looked hard, you could see the 1% that is pro-Biden. It is obvious that Bill is voting against Trump, not for Biden.
W.J. Van Sickle
Lives prevented
Fair Lawn, N.J.: In blaming President Trump for the carnage of COVID-19, the Daily News editorial compares the 200,000 lives lost to the number of Americans killed in Vietnam and the number lost annually to lung cancer (“His American carnage,” Sept. 23). It forgot one statistic: the approximately 330,000 unborn children wiped out every year by Planned Parenthood.
Jennifer Berenbaum
Careful what you wish for
Brooklyn: In response to Voicers Tamara Balin and Bruce Berensky: There is one angle on Roe v. Wade that hasn’t been addressed on these pages. Here it is: The rich will continue to get their abortions, if that is their wish. The poor or uninsured will return to the days of back-alley abortions, creating health issues that will result in increased costs for the government and taxpayers. This is not a partisan, religious or a political issue. It is a human rights issue.