![]() New York City differs from other major cities in criminal justice policy in at least three ways. ![]() ![]() Cease the reduction of inpatient psychiatric beds and increase use of outpatient civil commitment.Speak honestly and forthrightly about the problem of violent mentally ill offenders.Reduce the rate of substance abuse among criminal offenders via desistance mandates.This will require avoiding sentencing reforms that make participation in mental health courts unattractive. Protect the integrity of mental health courts.If Mayor Eric Adams seeks to effect further reductions in the jail population by reducing the rate of mental illness, he should focus on the following: That number rose throughout the de Blasio years. New York is host to more than 13,000 seriously mentally ill homeless adults. Concerns about public disorder remain persistent, as reflected in press coverage and 311 data.Inmates with any mental disorder and who have been charged with a violent felony constitute a growing share of the city jail population.Average length of stay in jail has been increasing for inmates with any mental disorder.This means that while general reforms aimed at reducing the jail population have kept some seriously mentally ill out of jail, the more targeted interventions designed for their specific benefit have been less effective. In relative terms, though, the rate of serious mental illness remains as high as ever (above 15%, compared with about 5% for the general adult population). In absolute terms, the number of seriously mentally ill people in jail in NYC has declined in recent years, tracking the jail decline more generally.This report will take stock of these efforts and frame the debate on crime and mental illness for the new mayor. At the same time, Mayor de Blasio’s high-profile “ThriveNYC” mental health program was supposed to prevent the deterioration of seriously mentally ill individuals in the community, and thereby keep them out of jail. For example, bail reform was supposed to reduce the deterioration that many mentally ill individuals experience in the city jail system. Most major mental health initiatives had a criminal justice motivation, at least in part, and most major criminal justice initiatives had a mental health motivation, at least in part. Throughout Bill de Blasio’s mayoralty, policymakers devoted considerable attention and resources to addressing this problem. In New York, as well as across the nation, the rate of mental illness is higher among the incarcerated population than among the general adult population. One is addressing the intersection of crime and mental illness. Reformers’ ability to reduce the jail census from the current average daily population, of 5,000–5,500, to their goal of about 3,000 will depend on a number of factors. More recently, though, the jail population has leveled off, raising questions about the plan to “close Rikers” (which would require even sharper reductions still) and the criminal justice reform agenda more generally. Throughout Bill de Blasio’s two terms as mayor of New York, a decline in crime and criminal justice reforms pushed down the jail population to historically low levels.
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