City To Demolish Brooklyn Jail After January Closure: Records

BROOKLYN, NY — The city has officially started the process to tear down the Brooklyn House of Detention, making way for its controversial rebuild of the Atlantic Avenue jail.

The city's Department of Design and Construction opened the bidding process for the "dismantling" of the 11-story Brooklyn jail on Thursday, asking construction companies to submit their proposals for demolishing the complex.

The request comes the same day that Mayor Bill de Blasio's administration announced that the 275 Atlantic Ave. jail, along with a complex on Rikers Island, will close early next year.

The Atlantic Avenue jail will close in January, around the same time that applications from construction companies to demolish it are due, records show. Prison staff will be reassigned, not laid off, and Brooklyn Detention Complex inmates will be moved to other borough jails, not Rikers Island, the mayor said.

Closing and demolishing the jail will make way for the new, larger facility that will be put in its place as part of the mayor's plan to replace Rikers Island with four new jails was approved by the City Council last month.

For the Brooklyn House of Detention, which is largely used to house those waiting for their bail hearing or trial, that means replacing the 11-story jail with a 29-story facility.

The jail was originally proposed to be 39 stories high, but was reduced as officials updated the plans to account for an even further expected drop in the city's incarcerated population.

The new jail will hold about 886 beds, a slight increase from its current ability to house 815 beds, though the jail already stands mostly empty. It housed only about 360 people last month.

The proposal comes after a week of meetings with dozens of design and construction firms about the "borough-based jail" plan, according to Crains.

The DDC met with more than 120 design and construction firms last week to detail its plans for the four jails, which will include new facilities in Manhattan, the Bronx and Queens in addition to the Brooklyn jail.

All four jail plans have been met with staunch criticism from lawmakers and community grousp like No New Jails, who argue that the city does not need build more cages to close Rikers.

No New Jails members have cast doubt on the city's commitment to closing its existing jails as it plans to spend billions of dollars on new ones rather than housing, health care and other critical services.

But others — including the 36-13 majority of City Council members that approved the jail plan — contend that the plan will pave the way to finally shutter Rikers Island, a place that has tortured and killed countless New Yorkers. The new facilities will have modern designs and give incarcerated people better access to their families, social services and the courts, from all of which they are isolated on Rikers, officials say.

The DDC did not immediately return a request for comment about the demolition request.