Bill Text: NY A04250 | 2021-2022 | General Assembly | Amended
Bill Title: Establishes a visiting program for incarcerated people, which gives incarcerated people opportunities for personal contact with relatives, friends, clergy, volunteers and other persons to promote better institutional adjustment and better community adjustment upon release.
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 25-0)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2022-05-10 - ordered to third reading rules cal.116 [A04250 Detail]
Download: New_York-2021-A04250-Amended.html
STATE OF NEW YORK ________________________________________________________________________ 4250--A 2021-2022 Regular Sessions IN ASSEMBLY February 1, 2021 ___________ Introduced by M. of A. WEPRIN, BARRON, WALKER, DE LA ROSA, GOTTFRIED, FERNANDEZ, EPSTEIN, REYES, CRUZ, AUBRY, HUNTER, TAYLOR, FORREST, QUART, BURGOS, SIMON, BURDICK -- read once and referred to the Commit- tee on Correction -- committee discharged, bill amended, ordered reprinted as amended and recommitted to said committee AN ACT to amend the correction law, in relation to the establishment of a visiting program for incarcerated people The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem- bly, do enact as follows: 1 Section 1. The correction law is amended by adding a new section 138-b 2 to read as follows: 3 § 138-b. Visiting program for the incarcerated. 1. State and local 4 correctional facilities shall provide visiting programs which give 5 incarcerated people opportunities for personal contact with their rela- 6 tives, children, friends, clergy, volunteers and other persons to 7 promote individual transformation, better institutional adjustment and 8 better community adjustment upon release. Such program shall include, 9 but not be limited to, (a) visiting hours that are reasonably likely to 10 accommodate persons traveling from within the state, including evening 11 and/or weekend hours, (b) visits of sufficient duration, including a 12 minimum of one hour at local correctional facilities so that visitors 13 and incarcerated people will be able to maintain relationship bonds, and 14 (c) a published overcrowding policy that is equitable with due consider- 15 ation to the distance traveled by the visitor, the frequency of the 16 visitor's visits, the most recent occasion that the incarcerated 17 person's visit was terminated due to overcrowding, and any other indi- 18 vidual circumstances that limit in-person visits between the incarcerat- 19 ed person and the visitor. 20 2. Video conferencing may supplement, but shall not take the place of, 21 in-person visits. EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets [] is old law to be omitted. LBD04355-03-1A. 4250--A 2 1 3. No incarcerated person is to be visited against his or her will by 2 any person. 3 § 2. This act shall take effect on the one hundred twentieth day after 4 it shall have become a law.