New York, NY – Chaplains Cost City Taxpayers $1M a Year

New York, NY – The case of New York’s embattled jailhouse imam, Umar Abdul-Jalil, is causing some to call into question the existence and size of the city’s prison chaplain program, which costs taxpayers more than $1 million a year.
The city’s Department of Correction employs 21 full-time and 19 part-time chaplains from the Muslim, Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish faiths.
Critics have suggested that the city’s employment of clergy is a misuse of taxpayer dollars when other major municipalities, including Los Angeles and Chicago, rely on volunteer chaplains to serve their inmates.

But the city, which has employed clergy in its jails for decades, says a volunteer-based program would not work for the around-the-clock needs of its jail system.

The city’s reliance on paid chaplains is an indication that its program has grown too big, the Republican leader in the City Council, James Oddo, said. “It seems that the chaplain program has gone the way of any other government program. It keeps growing over time,” Mr. Oddo said.

The paid chaplain division has drawn increased scrutiny after Abdul-Jalil was suspended last week while the city investigates whether his fiery comments warrant his dismissal.