New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision | |
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Abbreviation | NYS DOCCS |
Patch of the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision
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Logo of the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision
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Agency overview | |
Preceding agency | New York State Board of Prisons |
Employees | 31,300 |
Legal personality | Governmental: Government agency |
Jurisdictional structure | |
Operations jurisdiction* | State of New York, United States |
General nature | |
Operational structure | |
Headquarters | Main Office Building 2 W. Averell Harriman State Office Building Campus 1220 Washington Ave. Albany, New York Training Academy 1134 New Scotland Avenue, Albany, New York |
Sworn members | 23,000 |
Elected officer responsible | Anthony J. Annucci, Commissioner of Corrections and Community Supervision |
Facilities | |
Prisons | 60 |
Website | |
www.docss.ny.us Official website | |
Footnotes | |
* Divisional agency: Division of the country, over which the agency has usual operational jurisdiction. |
The New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (NYSDOCCS) is the department of the New York state government responsible for the care, confinement, and rehabilitation of inmates.
It is responsible for the care, confinement, and rehabilitation of approximately 54,700 inmates at 54 correctional facilities funded by the State of New York, and currently supervises 36,500 parolees at seven regional offices. The department employs a staff of approximately 31,300 individuals, including approximately 23,000 uniformed correction officers, and is currently the 12th largest state prison system in the United States. Its regulations are compiled in of the New York Codes, Rules and Regulations. The headquarters is located in Building 2 of the W. Averell Harriman State Office Building Campus in Albany.
In response to falling crime rates and prison populations in New York State, the Department has closed a number of facilities between 2009 and 2014. In 2011, the New York State Department of Correctional Services and the Division of Parole merged to form the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision.
The mission of NYSDOCS is to provide for public protection by administering a network of correctional facilities that:
The New York State prison system had its beginnings in 1797 with a single prison called Newgate located in New York City. A second state prison opened 20 years later in Auburn in 1817, and in 1825 a group of Auburn prisoners made the voyage across the Erie Canal and down the Hudson River to begin building Sing Sing.
The state commissioned architect Alfred Hopkins to design three major institutions built between 1933 and 1935: Wallkill Correctional Facility, Woodbourne Correctional Facility and Coxsackie Correctional Facility. All three were designed on progressive principles, reflected a concern for aesthetics and a sense of place, and had no surrounding walls or fences. That has changed.