Helen Skipper (NYC Justice Peer Initiative) on lived experience and treatment court expansion

I'll be very brief.

We increased our paralegal staff by 400% over the last four years, and all of that workflow for discovery reform works through the–

Increased capacity that our paralegals have.

At BDS, we've obviously increased our discovery paralegals who receive download and then upload our discovery,

our computer system so that we can store all of that discovery and ensure that everything is maintained for a number of years, even after a conviction or a dismissal or an acquittal.

But the computer technology to store that data, the cloud storage that's required, is costly.

But we have a system in place now.

Is it fully up and running?

It is.

It is.

At Neighborhood Defender Service, we similarly have had to improve our technology and our computer systems for being able to store that discovery, but also to invest in the security around it.

There have been major concerns around attacks on our systems, on...

Hackers in our systems.

And so we've had to invest a lot of resources into making sure that our clients'information is safe and secure.

Similarly, at the Bronx Defenders, we have invested in discovery administrators.

We also had the challenge of engaging with the vendor who was super problematic in being able to address these unique office and borough dynamics.

We have invested a lot in cloud storage to Young Me's BDS example as well.

And you pull it up and run it and it's functional.

We are up and running.

I would not say that it's ideal.

No, it is not.

Thank you to the panel.

We're going to call up the next panel.

Helen Skipper.

Zachary Kastenerson, Jennifer Parrish, Chaplain Phillips, Ryan Aquanota.

Yep, thank you.

Two minutes.

I ain't got no time to read all of this.

I can begin?

Okay.

Good afternoon, Chair and members of the committee.

Thank you for the opportunity to testify today.

My name is Helen Skip Skipper.

I serve as the Executive Director of the New York City Justice Peer Initiative, and I come before you as a directly impacted woman, a lived experience advocate, a scholervist,

meaning a scholar and activist, and a pracademic, meaning a practitioner and academic who studies.

These systems while working inside the community to change them.

I also served this city as the vice chair of the New York City Board of Correction.

I offer this testimony from a place where these roles meet.

Lived experience, public accountability, community expertise, and a deep belief that people closest to the problem are closest to the solution.

So we already know that the jail population has been cited at over 6,600 people.

This number changes daily, but the direction of the crisis is clear.

If New York City is serious about closing Rikers Island and moving to a smaller borough-based jail as required by law, this population must come down.

Let me say that plainly.

We do not close Rikers by managing harm more efficiently.

close Rikers by refusing to send people to jail when they are in need of care.

We do not get to the borough-based system by polishing the machinery of detention.

We do not get anywhere in the continued criminalizations of those with behavioral health concerns.

And I speak this point out of experience, even though I am the vice chair of the New York City Board of Correction.

For the last three years, I need to say.

I grew up on Rikers Island.

I spent 25 years going in and out of Rikers Island.

Every time I appeared before a judge, I was suffering from a drug addiction and unchecked mental illness.

At no point did I receive support or treatment.

I was always given jail.

And because of that, I spent 25 years of my life going in and out.

The Treatment Court Expansion Act, if it had been around at that time, would have stopped that.

So I want to push for that also.

I would like to respectfully ask that we, those of us who are in service, those of us who are pushing to do the right thing, that we push for the Treatment Care Expansion Act, which can also lower the population.

We push for DOC to utilize the 6A program more.

And we push for more funding for alternatives to incarceration and detention.

And we employ more people with lived experience.

We have been through the fire, but we don't smell like smoke.

Thank you.

I'm sure you know.

If you've been following our hands, we have been pushing on the 6A and a number of the things that you've mentioned.

But thank you for your advocacy.

Thank you so much.

I appreciate you.