The Spofford Juvenile Detention Center was an eyesore for the Hunts Point community in the Bronx, NY. It was an intake facility for people under 15 years of age awaiting trial or placement in a larger facility. Over the 54 years it was owned and operated by the Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ), its foreboding white brick buildings housed an average of 289 young people at a time – 95% of whom were African American or Latino and 54% came from the surrounding low-income neighborhoods.

The Center became infamous for its poor living conditions and for abusing its youth inmates. Dining halls were overrun with rats, windows were barred, hallways were poorly lit, and it was notoriously overcrowded. It was also the site of serious human rights abuses. In 1997, 48 child abuse claims were made against Spofford’s employees. In one case, a counselor was accused of sexually molesting a 15-year-old girl whose hands and feet were shackled. Another counselor was convicted of an attempted assault in the beating of a young boy. Fifty suicide attempts were reported in a single year in the 1980s.

For years, the Hunts Point community and criminal justice advocates had campaigned for the facility’s closure. In 1998, the City shut down Spofford, but due to crowding issues in other facilities, it was soon reopened. Finally, in 2011 the City closed down Spofford for good and the land lay fallow until 2016. The City Council then unanimously voted to approve a mixed-use affordable housing development project called The Peninsula. The project was to be developed in three phases, the first of which (Phase 1A) is the project this case study focuses on.