By Nick Buglione
Fearing that the surrounding East Meadow community would be inundated with traffic, the jail had only been allowing inmates with last names beginning with letters A through M to see visitors on one Saturday, and those with names beginning with N through Z the next.
A smooth and uneventful year of Saturday visits at the jail, along with some prodding from the Nassau County chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union, has prompted the county to extend visitation rights to all inmates on Saturdays beginning July 12.
"We are going to go ahead with it," said David Chauvin, spokesman for County Executive Thomas Suozzi. "Unless there are any major problems that occur in the future, which we don't foresee."
The Nassau County Jail Advisory Committee, a board of East Meadow civic leaders that meets regularly on jail issues, seems reluctantly willing to accept the change.
"The numbers sort of bear out that hopefully it will be a non-event," said Richard Cardozo, committee member and president of the Carman Community Association. "They have it sufficiently under control. There's been no problems that we know of."
The Jail Advisory Committee was initially opposed to the idea of introducing any visiting hours on Saturdays, citing traffic, safety and financial concerns. A six-month trial in 2002, however, proved the committee's fears were unfounded.
"The Jail Advisory Committee has expressed concern over the facility to begin with and the fact of having weekend visitation," said Richard Bivone, who sits on the committee and is also vice president of the Council of East Meadow Community Organizations.
The changes have been made permanent, shifting the jail's visiting hours from the old Monday-to-Friday, noon-to-8 p.m. slots to a Tuesday-to-Saturday schedule. From Tuesday to Friday, visiting hours will stay as they were, while on Saturday they will run from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m.
"I'm in favor of it, personally," said committee member Viki DeJong, on opening Saturday visiting hours to the full alphabet. "Unless a problem arises. Then they can always reverse the changes."
Still, some members couldn't help but wonder what the county will ask them to concede to next. "When does it stop?" said Bivone. "Do you want to have Sundays? Do you want us to start busing the inmates to their relatives?"
Barbara Bernstein, executive director of the Nassau County chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union, maintains that the positives of allowing all inmates to have visitors on Saturdays outweigh the negatives. "They've cut out Monday visiting hours, and there are no Sunday visiting hours, so right now there's a huge gap between Saturday and Tuesday," Bernstein said. "Then there's a huge pileup [of visitors] on Tuesday."
Loosening the Saturday visiting hour restrictions will reduce the overcrowding that's occurring on Tuesdays, Bernstein claims.
She went on to note that splitting the alphabet has produced a lopsided number of visitors an alternating Saturdays, considering that there are far more inmates with last names that start with A through M than N through Z.
"There's no reason for them not to try it, at least for the same period we tried the half alphabet," Bernstein said.
