News

Mediation is underway between the state and state correction officers who have been striking against some prisons, citing poor working conditions and safety issues. That’s according to Spectrum Local News. The illegal strikes are designed to call attention to their request to also repeal the “Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement” Act, also known as HALT, which, among other things, gives inmates more time outside their cells. The mediation session is scheduled to run through the end of the day. Last week, Governor Kathy Hochul said she understood that correction officers do incredibly difficult work under challenging circumstances…

Hochul also called in the National Guard last week to assist in the prisons where staff are striking. Rockland Sheriff Lou Falco says sending in the National Guard isn’t the best of ideas, since they aren’t trained specifically to do the job of a correction officer…

Republican state lawmakers recently released statistics from the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision that show that since the HALT Act was launched three years ago, inmate-on-inmate assaults have increased 169 percent, and inmate-on-staff assaults have gone up 76 percent.

As the newly-formed Department of Government Efficiency makes cuts to many agencies in the federal government, Rockland’s congressman is on board, asking people to give the group the chance to do their work. Congressman Mike Lawler of the Hudson Valley’s 17th district told “The Morning Show” yesterday, because the group is moving swiftly, there are inevitably chances mistakes will happen…

The Associated Press reported yesterday that more than 20 civil service employees resigned Tuesday from the Department of Government Efficiency, refusing to use their technical expertise to, quote, “dismantle critical public services.” The New York Times reported yesterday that several large cuts listed by the agency have already been altered, including one that was originally listed as an $8 billion cut from ICE, while the actual contract was actually worth $8 million, that thanks to a mistaken entry in a federal contracting database.

Two men were arrested Saturday during a traffic stop in Orange County on gun possession charges. State Police in Tarrytown say a Honda sedan was pulled over for traffic violations around 4pm when they found them with a loaded Taurus G2 handgun. 20 year-old Jamar Mikel Sanders and 28 year-old Zaquan Clark, from the Bronx and Utica, were charged with Criminal Possession of a Firearm. The pair were arraigned. Sanders was being held on bail while Clark was held in the Orange County Jail without bail due to prior convictions. They are due in Town of Tuxedo Court tomorrow.

A Nanuet heart transplant recipient and dear friend of WRCR, a crusader for the cause for organ donation, is recovering after suffering congestive heart failure, after noticing something wrong with her breathing Sunday. “Michael’s Gifts” host Roxanne Watson has been an activist for organ donation and has herself registered more than 14,000 people for the Donor Registry here in New York State. Roxanne called from her hospital bed at the Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx yesterday and said she’s undergoing tests to see what the next steps will be…

Roxanne says it’s critical to know the warning signs of heart trouble so that the worst can be avoided. Roxanne received a heart transplant in 2010 from 23-year-old Michael Bovill, a Coast Guard Fireman, who died in July that year, and she’s been registering people to become organ donors in his name ever since. Roxanne’s show is heard exclusively here on WRCR every Wednesday after the 9am News during “The Morning Show.”