UNION LEADERS PRESENT LIST OF DEMANDS AS STRIKE BY STATE PRISON GUARDS ENTERS PERILOUS NEW PHASE
WITH THE NATIONAL GUARD READYING TO DEPLOY INSIDE NY'S PRISONS, STATE OFFICIALS AND UNION LEADERS HELD PEACE TALKS IN ALBANY TUESDAY AFTERNOON
Striking state prison guards and their supporters outside the maximum-security Clinton Correctional Facility Tuesday afternoon. Photo credit: JB Nicholas.
Feb. 18, 2025
Leaders from the union representing New York's prison guards met with state officials in Albany to present a list of demands for resolving the wildcat strike that enveloped more than 25 of the state's 42 prisons by Tuesday afternoon.
Tuesday morning, state prison officials activated “Doomsday” plans as guards walked off the job in prison-after-prison across the state. Just before the meeting, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced she "ordered the National Guard be mobilized to secure our correctional facilities in the event it is not resolved by tomorrow. "
The high-stakes sit down was held at the Albany headquarters of the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision, DOCCS, the state agency that manages New York's prison system.
DOCCS' Commissioner, Daniel F. Martuscello, III, and his team met with leadership of the guards' union, the New York State Correctional Officer and Police Benevolent Association, or NYSCOPBA.
While NYSCOPBA says it didn’t sanction the strike, Gov. Hochul said she ordered the meeting “to call for an end to the unlawful work stoppage that is causing significant public safety concerns across New York.”
Union leaders used the meeting to press their striking members’ demands.
"We had that list of demands with us and we went through it one-by-one," Matt Keough, Executive Vice President of the group, told The Free Lance.
Titled "Return to Work Demands from NYS Correction Officers," the list of demands was revealed by guards from one of the two prisons where the strike started on Monday. At the top of the list's 17 demands: "Reversal of HALT BILL."
List of demands by striking state prison guards. Photo credit: unknown, via source.
The HALT Act passed the state legislature and was signed into law by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in 2021. It places a 15-day limit on the amount of time prisoners can be placed in solitary confinement for misconduct. After that, they can be segregated from the general population but must be given rehabilitative programming and allowed 4-6 hours outside of a cell everyday.
Guards said it emboldened prisoners to break the rules, and even attack guards.
"We had a discussion about the repeal of HALT to see if Gov. Hochul could use her executive power to suspend HALT," Keough said. "Her counsel's office said they would have to see if she even has the authority to do that."
Keough said after the meeting NYSCOPBA leaders "went back to our office as a board and came up with three specific asks of the Department and the Governor and we sent them over and are awaiting a response."
Keough said he was "not at liberty to disclose the three asks at this time" in case the talks fall apart. Still, he added, "The NYSCOPBA board, the DOCCS team and the people from the Gov's office are seeking a speedy resolution to this for everyone."
DOCCS acknowledged the sit-down in a joint news release with Gov. Hochul:
“Earlier today we met with NYSCOPBA President Summers and his Executive Board to discuss a path forward to returning all facilities to normal operations and ending this illegal strike."
The Department also issued a point-by-point answer to the guards’ 17 demands.
As The Free Lance reported last Monday, New York's entire 42-jail state prison system was facing a crisis before the strike.
There's fallout from the killing of Robert Brooks by guards at the Marcy Correctional Facility, mass suspected Fentanyl "exposure" incidents, what Inspector General Lucy Lang called "significant workers’ compensation-driven staffing shortages" and a scarcity of new recruits.
Then, two weeks ago, the union voted no confidence in commissioner Martuscello.
Meanwhile behind the wall on Tuesday, according to messages and telephone calls family members of prisoners received from loved ones, many were kept in their cell-blocks or dormitories and served modified meals. Visits were suspended. A sergeant in street clothes was dispensing medication at Auburn. Parole board hearings at Collins were cancelled.
At the Riverview Correctional Facility, a truck carrying food was prevented from delivering to the facility, presumably because its teamster driver wouldn’t cross the picket line, according to a celebratory social media post by a striking guard.
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