ALBANY, N.Y. (NEWS10) — Phone calls from inside state prisons in New York are now completely free. The state Department of Corrections will cover the full cost of the calls the families previously had to cover.

This week on Empire State Weekly, Bianca Tylek, the Executive Director for Worth Rises, expressed that the change will have impacts both in and out of prisons. She explained that families of incarcerated people collectively spend $13 billion per year to make calls to their loved ones.

"It allows people who are incarcerated to engage in their rehabilitative process," Tylek said. "People who are connected to their communities are more likely to have hope to participate in programs to be able to plan for their release, for housing, for employment. That means when they come home, they

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