(New York, NY) -- The NYC Department of Social Services-Human resources Administration announced a new policy pilot program that will make applying for critical benefits like Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) more accessible for incarcerated New Yorkers. The policy change, which will help ensure that New Yorkers who are coming home have access to the supports they need to put food on the table and successfully reenter their communities -- is the direct result of  collaboration between Manhattan DA candidate Lucy Lang, Director of the National Executive Council (NEC) at Columbia University’s Center for Justice Jay Holder, and community advocates, along with system-impacted people. 

The pilot will allow incarcerated people to apply for (SNAP) benefits while in prison, and assist them in the application process. Previously, incarcerated New Yorkers were ineligible to apply for SNAP benefits while in prison, creating a gap between when they are released and when they can afford to put food on the table. This issue -- compounded by barriers to housing, employment, education, and other collateral consequences of criminal justice involvement -- perpetuates an endless cycle of incarceration that fails to provide system-impacted people with the resources they need to succeed after prison.

“Time and again, I have seen my incarcerated students released to New York City with no idea where their next meal is coming from,” said Manhattan DA candidate Lucy Lang. “I’m honored to have partnered with Jay Holder and directly impacted New Yorkers to create this policy that will help put food on the table for people returning to their communities and bring us one step closer to a system that treats people with the dignity they deserve. I applaud the NYC Department of Social Services and the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision for working to ensure that SNAP benefits are available to those who need them, without delay.”

“As I left prison, I was given $40 by the state and a bus ticket back to Manhattan,” said Jay Holder, Director of the National Executive Council (NEC) at Columbia University’s Center for Justice. “The realization quickly set in that $40 dollars is not enough to put food on the table. I found myself in a position that’s familiar to so many who returned back to prison due to inadequate resources. But, unlike others, I was fortunate to participate with a college in prison program. I took the problem to my professors and a few of my formerly incarcerated peers who participated with Lucy Lang’s college in prison course that allowed us to understand the impact of policy on people’s lives. Just imagine the pressure being put on neighborhoods whose returning citizens don’t have enough resources to eat. Together with Lucy, we used the transformative power of education to come up with a solution that will change people’s lives across the City. Education in prison is one of the greatest public safety tools. ” 

About Lucy Lang

ucy Lang has spent her entire career working with those who have been impacted by the criminal justice system – from incarcerated people to crime victims and their families – many of whom are now active supporters and advisors to her campaign. As a former Assistant District Attorney, Lucy created a first-of-its-kind, semester-long, college-in-prison program that brought assistant district attorneys into New York prisons to study criminal justice alongside incarcerated students. The program has since become the gold standard for district attorneys’ offices across the country. 

The success of this program, and her desire to advocate for reforms in the criminal justice system, led Lucy to become the director of the Institute for Innovation in Prosecution at John Jay College. There, she worked with leading district attorneys across the country, crime survivors, and system-impacted people on innovative criminal justice reforms related to racial justice, restorative justice, trauma, data transparency, and police accountability. 

Lucy has the most comprehensive policy platform of any candidate for district attorney – with a comprehensive policy book available on her website on issues ranging from police accountability, to sex crimes, gun violence, racial and restorative justice, conviction integrity, LGBTQ+ rights, and more. She is the leading voice in the race advocating to restore voting rights for the incarcerated – while they are incarcerated – so that the system and those seeking to run it are forced to address and engage with the people most impacted by it.