New York Bans Most Prison Care Packages from Family and Friends

On Monday, more than 6,000 people incarcerated in New York prisons lost their right to regularly receive care packages by mail or in person from family and friends.

The state prison agency is piloting the new restrictions at eight prisons, with plans to expand them to the rest. Under the policy, family and friends are no longer allowed to bring their loved ones packages of food when they come to visit or to send them through the mail, and can’t send more than two non-food packages each year. Everything else must be purchased and sent through private companies willing to ship to prisons.

The new restrictions are a revived version of a stalled 2018 initiative, the “Secure Vendor Package Program,” which would have required all packages to be sent from six approved private companies. Those prison-specific vendors offered limited selections at steep markups, with prices as much as 130 percent higher than on the outside. After immense pushback, then-Governor Andrew Cuomo directed the agency to halt the program after just 10 days.

New York is one of the few states that still permits non-vendor packages to be sent to incarcerated people at all. The majority of state correctional departments have entered contracts with private package companies, including New York. “Reintroducing the secure vendor program is an unfortunate and avoidable step in the direction that so many other corrections agencies across the country have gone,” says Jennifer Scaife, executive director of the Correctional Association of New York, the state’s legally designated prison monitor.

While the 2018 program only allowed certain approved vendors, the new program doesn’t force people to choose from a limited list. Instead, it doesn’t define “vendor” at all. But Wilfredo Laracuente, who was released from Sing Sing Correctional Facility in July, predicted that the new policy will offer little more choice than its predecessor.

“A lot of the families, they use Walmart, they use Target, they use Western Beef, they use Shoprite, they use Tops, they use Wegmans. The majority of these places don’t ship directly to correctional facilities,” Laracuente said. “If we can’t really get the items that we need to go ahead and shop for our family members, then we have to use the six vendors that were originally introduced to use.”

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