Every five days since he took office, like clockwork, former Mayor Eric Adams signed a temporary executive order extending a state of emergency inside the city’s jails — a maneuver that circumvents many strict Board of Correction rules intended to ensure the safe housing of people behind bars.
Now his successor, Zohran Mamdani, has to decide by Tuesday whether to renew the order yet again or allow the reinstatement of the board’s Minimum Standards, which include rules sharply restricting the use of solitary confinement.
“We are optimistic he will not continue illegal and ill-advised emergency orders of the Adams administration related to Rikers Island,” said Victor Pate, Co-Director of the HALT Solitary Campaign.
On Friday, Mamdani was noncommittal.
“We will be signing all the executive orders that we need to by the time that we do,” he told reporters at an unrelated press conference.
That’s not the only major decision the new mayor’s legal team will have to make on jail management: the prior administration went to court to successfully block a solitary confinement ban the City Council made law more than two years ago. To reverse that decision, Mamdani’s lawyers would have to go back to court.
The case is before the federal judge overseeing the Department of Correction, who ordered that a “remediation manager” take over parts of the department while spending the past six months vetting possible candidates.
The choices for the Mamdani administration come amid deep uncertainty at the Department of Correction, which has yet to get a new commissioner named by the rookie mayor.
By contrast, Adams named Louis Molina, a former NYPD detective, as his DOC commissioner several weeks before he was sworn in as mayor in January 2022.
In the meantime, while the restrictive new solitary rules were set to go into effect in mid-2024, the DOC took no visible steps to implement them, according to advocates and people familiar with jail operations.
Mamdani’s press office did not immediately respond to a request seeking comment.
During a campaign debate, Mamdani called Rikers Island, currently home to all the city’s operating jail facilities, “a stain on the history of our city” that must be closed.
But he hasn’t said how he plans to reduce the growing population or operate the jail system before it is required to close and replaced by new borough-based facilities under construction.
If Mamdani lets the emergency executive order expire, it would likely prompt a clash with DOC leadership, the federal monitor and the politically powerful union representing city correction officers.
Renewing it, even temporarily, risks alienating reform advocates who see solitary confinement as a moral and public health failure. They are urging the new mayor to take swift and meaningful action.
Incoming City Council Speaker Julie Menin said the law’s continued delay has been a choice, not a necessity.
“The City Council voted overwhelmingly to end solitary confinement because it is proven to cause profound harm and makes our jails less safe,” Menin told THE CITY. “That law should have already been implemented, but the previous mayor continued to rely on emergency executive orders to delay it, undermining the will of the Council and the rule of law.”
The battle over limiting the use of solitary confinement has intensified since the death of Layleen Polanco on June 7, 2019.
The 27-year-old transgender woman was in the ninth day of a 20-day solitary confinement sentence when she was found lifeless inside her Rikers cell. She was being held in lieu of a $500 bond for misdemeanor sex work and drug possession charges.
A bill to ban the practice in New York City was first introduced in December 2020.
But former City Council Speaker Corey Johnson blocked the legislation from ever coming before the full legislative body for a vote. The move surprised some jail activists, who noted that Johnson publicly supported the legislation.
In November 2021, then-Mayor Bill de Blasio first signed executive orders suspending multiple Board of Correction regulations, citing chaos brought on by the COVID pandemic.
The move froze a highly anticipated plan to implement the Risk Management Accountability System, designed to strictly limit the use of solitary confinement. It also allowed the Department of Correction to move officers to 12-hour shifts and limit how much time detainees can spend outside of their cells.
A new version of the legal measure was introduced by Public Advocate Jumaane Williams and backed by former City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, whose mother was a correctional officer.
Williams and the Council spent more than a year fine-tuning the legislation before what is known as Local 42 passed with overwhelming support. Adams vetoed the bill, arguing that limiting solitary would make it impossible for city correction officers to reduce jailhouse violence.
But the Council overrode that rejection, noting that putting detainees in solitary for long stretches is considered a form of torture and can lead to major mental deterioration, especially for younger people.
In response, Adams signed another emergency executive order, this one blocking the new rules from taking effect.
Correction officials have long argued that alternatives to solitary — such as specialized housing units and increased clinical staffing — require resources that the department does not currently have.
The Council sued, arguing that Adams was unfairly using his executive powers to circumvent the law.
In June, New York State Supreme Court Justice Jeffrey Pearlman agreed, ruling that Adams exceeded his emergency powers when he issued executive orders suspending Local Law 42.
Additional reporting by Katie Honan.
