Mayor Zohran Mamdani on April 7, 2026 announced a new treatment center at Bellevue Hospital that will move some Rikers Island detainees with complicated medical needs to Manhattan for specialty care. The first therapeutic housing unit is set to open in Kips Bay and will serve 104 people in custody.
Mamdani said the new setup is the first step toward closing Rikers, the troubled jail complex that has long been a political and legal flashpoint in New York City. He said detainees who need care will no longer have to wait critical hours and travel off site, calling the move a way to make specialty services “just an elevator ride away” and to shift people out of crumbling conditions into a space designed for rehabilitation.
The Bellevue unit will have direct access to oncology, cardiology and neurology services, while two other therapeutic housing units are planned for NYC Health + Hospitals/Woodhull in Brooklyn and North Central Bronx. Those sites will have 144 beds and 92 beds, respectively, and will serve patients with significant mental health needs. The city’s Department of Correction will provide security, custody management, programming and other services.
Dr. Patsy Yang said the outposted units are a first and are unique, describing them as a milestone in treating people more respectfully and decently. Dr. Helen Arteaga said medical care has been difficult to access for people in the correctional system, especially at Rikers, and said the change ends that. Mamdani said the Bellevue opening is only the first step, not the finish line, and that the city still faces a steep climb to meet the 2027 jail-closure deadline.
That deadline has become more precarious as the city tries to get four borough-based jails running by next year, a task widely seen as a high hurdle. Mamdani said it is practically impossible to meet the 2027 cutoff after years of flouting recommendations and requirements, while Todd Shapiro called that finger-pointing a cop out and pressed the mayor to show how he will safely reduce the jail population. For now, the plan answers the immediate question: some detainees who need the most specialized medical care are moving out of Rikers, and the city is betting Bellevue is the opening move in finally shutting the jail complex down.
