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REGIONAL UPDATES
Ann Arbor,
Michigan
The most serious issues brought to us
by Michigan prisoners continue to be about health care. In
2002 and the first three weeks of January 2003, we received
well over 1,000 letters and phone calls from prisoners regarding
unmet health care needs. The complaints range from infections
being left untreated, to the denial of recommended surgery
or follow-up with specialists, to denial of treatment for
Hepatitis C, to the withholding of medication for pain or
mental illness. We receive approximately five to ten prisoner
communications per week regarding untreated medical conditions
that are, by any standards, shocking and urgent. We also feel
there is a correlation between the plummeting quality of medical
care in Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) prisons
and MDOC's outsourcing of those services to Correctional Medical
Services (CMS). Program director Penny Ryder and associate
Phillis Engelbert met with MDOC health directors in Lansing
on January 22, 2003, and presented them with a long list of
grievances about the health care system. While the officials
generally defended the quality of health care in Michigan
prisons, they did voice a desire to improve conditions and
stated that they have begun a process of monitoring CMS. They
just renewed a contract with CMS, but only for two years (not
the four CMS had requested)-and with stringent monitoring
procedures written in. We also discussed the need for better
communication, i.e. that they respond to our messages about
unmet health care needs.
Michigan prisons are almost at capacity; at the same time,
the state's budget is in dire straits. MDOC officials have
presented a plan to the new Governor, Jennifer Granholm (D),
regarding the early release of nonviolent prisoners and those
past their earliest release dates. Republican lawmakers, meanwhile,
are clamoring to build new prisons. Penny is part of a statewide
coalition of criminal justice workers advocating that Granholm
reduce the prison population. No official action has been
taken yet.
Cambridge,
Massachusetts
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| Photo:
AFSC, Cambridge, MA
Prisoner Rights
Unity Day, October 19, 2002, sponsored by the regional
office in Cambridge, Mass. |
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| Photo:
AFSC
Final Exposure,
Lou Jones' book of photographs about life on death
row. See order
form. |
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As always, Cambridge has been active
on many fronts. The Campaign to Build Safer Communities (www.shutdownddu.org),
launched in April of last year and made up primarily of ex-prisoners
and families of prisoners, addresses the issue of solitary
confinement and how it adversely affects all of our communities.
Recent victories for the campaign have included the Massachusetts
Supreme Court ruling in Haverty v. Commissioner of Corrections,
which said that prisoners cannot be classified to conditions
of solitary confinement and must be awarded due process. The
campaign's legislative committee pushed for the introduction
of two new bills in 2003, one which will require the Department
of Corrections to report annually on recidivism, and break
out statistics specifically on control units; and another
which forbids punishing self-injurious behavior and suicide
attempts with isolation. The committee is also working with
a coalition of legislative caucuses and committees to develop
a legislative education day focused on the "Cost Effectiveness
of the Departmental Disciplinary Unit." In early December,
the campaign launched a Western Massachusetts branch.
In late 2002, photographer Lou Jones'
compelling book of photographs about life on death row, Final
Exposure, was published in collaboration with AFSC. Boston's
National Center of African American Art (NCAAA) will be exhibiting
Lou's photographs in their museum in 2003 from March 30 to
June 29. Barry Gaither, director of the NCAAA, will couple
the exhibit with an exhibit of landscape paintings of sites
of lynchings. The Cambridge office will work with the NCAAA
to create a series of forums and lectures focusing on the
issue of the death penalty and the historical connection to
lynching of Black men. After the exhibit at the NCAAA, the
images will move to the Massachusetts State House. AFSC's
national office is also involved in this project.
"Inspiring, educating and mobilizing the hip-hop generation"
was the tag line behind the first annual Active Arts Youth
Conference (www.activeartsyouthconference.com)
held in Boston September 20-22, 2002. Sponsored by AFSC's
Critical Breakdown program, it drew over 1000 activists, students,
former political prisoners, artists, and youth from as far
as California. Kicking off with a concert by Dead Prez and
some of the other most conscious hip-hop artists of today,
the weekend featured workshops on many different issues that
are facing the hip-hop generation. Participants discussed
everything from AIDS education to guerilla art to militarism
to media perceptions of hip-hop to women's voices. In a visionary
move, the conference organizers put together a panel of former
political prisoners and another of the children of current
political prisoners. Both panels discussed how to integrate
political prisoners into the larger anti-prison industrial
complex movement.
Dayton,
Ohio
AFSC's Ohio Criminal Justice Program,
based in the Dayton office, has existed since 1983. Over the
past several years, it has become clear that students at Ohio's
many universities have become much more aware of criminal
justice issues and how they affect the entire society. Students
have made the connection between the ballooning prison industrial
complex and the shrinking pool of resources available for
higher education. Thanks to money that was available in the
region, the Ohio Criminal Justice Program has been able to
add, for a limited period of time, a full-time criminal justice
associate to tap into this student energy.
Steve Bright will be serving as criminal justice associate
through May of 2003. His main project will be reaching out
to, educating, and organizing college students on 16 campuses
across the state. Students will learn about life for Ohio's
prisoners, ex-prisoners, and their families and friends. They
will be invited to participate in program activities such
as anti-death penalty rallies, the supermax pen pal project,
and the annual legislative action day. The culmination of
this organizing effort will be a statewide criminal justice
and prison issues conference for students and other activists.
Newark,
New Jersey
Newark's Prison Watch Project works on
behalf of prisoners suffering from isolation, use of devices
of torture, and other confinement conditions that violate
U.N. covenants and treaties. Our work with prisoners and advocates
nationwide has contributed to several recent court settlements.
One, in Wisconsin, included a provision that all mentally
ill prisoners be released from the Boscobel Supermax facility.
A New Jersey decision resulted in the removal of all except
four prisoners from Management Control Units. Prison Watch
also recently conducted a "listening project" with
youngsters from the New Directions Youth Project, who testified
on their experiences in the local youth detention facility.
They described racism, cold, filth, isolation, beatings and
the use of pepper spray by guards, inappropriate use of psychotropic
drugs, and sexual abuse; "Our Children's House,"
a new pamphlet, features their testimonies in print. Other
current activities include work on mandatory minimum issues,
voting rights for ex-prisoners, civil commitments, and street
organization (gang) issues.
The Prisoners Resource Center (PRC) helps former inmates (1,600-1,800
annually) reintegrate into their communities, resolve emergency
needs, make decisions regarding vocational and/or educational
goals, prepare for employment, and increase personal and/or
family stability. Life Skills workshops in county jails and
halfway houses focus on ways to discover job opportunities,
make contact with employers, fill out job applications, write
a resume and cover letters, and behave appropriately in a
work setting. Employability Skills Workshops include counsel
on how to address questions about arrest or imprisonment.
Upon release, the PRC offers referrals to shelter, food, clothing,
and additional treatment, and provides job listings, supervised
job-search assistance, and individual, short-term peer counseling
for social adjustment problems.
A high percentage of Newark's African American and Hispanic
youth encounter the juvenile and criminal justice systems.
The New Directions Youth Project is a mentoring initiative
that provides young people with opportunities to immerse themselves
in a supportive 27-week curriculum and a summer employment
program. The program focuses on personal, cultural, and historical
awareness; access to community resources; formulation of life
goals; and reorientation of one's personal journey toward
achievement and social activism. The Project recruits forward-thinking
adult mentors who understand and identify with the intellectual,
social, and cultural obstacles faced by inner city youths.
Oakland,
California
The Oakland criminal justice office has,
essentially, three programs: a youth program, staffed by Tony
Coleman; an anti-death penalty program, staffed by Eric Moon;
and a criminal justice general program, staffed by Laura Magnani.
The youth project has pioneered Know Your Rights training
with youth, which focuses on how to handle police stops and
searches. Currently, the program is involved in using hip-hop
and other cultural expression to empower youth and to organize
on juvenile and police issues. This cultural work enables
youth to lift up their own voices and connect with other politically
conscious youth.
Paralleling AFSC's national work, Oakland's death penalty
organizing focuses primarily on religious communities. Through
California People of Faith Working Against the Death Penalty,
Eric has helped local chapters get started and push educational
and policy agendas in their areas. Ten local city councils
and county boards of supervisors have passed resolutions calling
for a moratorium on the death penalty, primarily due to pressure
brought from faith-based groups. In partnership with the Friends
Committee on Legislation, the anti-death penalty program also
published a new edition of the pamphlet "This Life We
Take," which looks at how the death penalty works in
California.
The criminal justice general program has had two main focuses
in the past year: writing a comprehensive analysis of the
criminal justice system from an AFSC perspective, and convening
Surviving Life, a group for women doing life sentences. Networking
and monitoring prison policy changes make up the rest of the
general program.
Syracuse,
New York
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| Photo:
AFSC, Syracuse
Girls participating
in the Syracuse Region sponsored "Girls' Cultural
Breakout" |
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Girls' Cultural Breakout, held August
30 to Septem-ber 1, 2002, provided a hands-on art experience
for 10 young women of color, 13 to 16 years old, who have
an incarcerated loved one.
The AFSC's Families Count! Families of Prisoners Support Project
works with people who have special needs because of a loved
one's incarceration. Children are profoundly affected when
a parent or loved one is in prison. They have many confusing
emotions that they need to sort out and express. Too often,
children who have an incarcerated loved one are at greater
risk of developing behaviors that can eventually lead to their
being jailed themselves some day.
Girls' Cultural Breakout was designed to give these young
women the opportunity to get away for two nights and three
days to explore their feelings through art. The girls experienced
storytelling; African Drumming, rhythm, dancing, and drum
making; and African mask making as tools through which they
could express their unique experience as African American
teenage women. In addition to the arts sessions, the girls
attended workshops and discussion sessions to help them get
at self esteem issues and deep emotions. These sessions helped
the girls figure out what they want to say through their art.
The girls had the opportunity to teach younger children what
they learned at a sharing event on December 20, 2002.
Tucson,
Arizona
The Tucson office is attempting to take
advantage of Arizona's current budget crisis by educating
state legislators about the potential cost savings of amending
sentencing laws to divert people into treatment and community-based
programs. While the corrections budget is considered a "sacred
cow," we are pointing out the huge budget the Arizona
Department of Corrections commands and the excessive number
of nonviolent and first-time prisoners who are incarcerated
in the state. We are also trying to embolden the legislators
by pointing out the number of other conservative states that
are making such changes and the recent opinion polls that
show a majority of Americans support alternative sentences
for people convicted of nonviolent offenses. The legislature
recently created a sentencing commission to review the Arizona
criminal code. We are working with this body to point out
the disparities in sentences and urge them to eliminate mandatory
minimum sentences.
We are also partnering with a group of students and faculty
at the University of Arizona for an Education Not Incarceration
campaign. We are having student groups and professors sign
a letter that calls for the state to scrap plans to build
two new private prisons (one for women, the other for DUI
prisoners), and divert those funds back into the universities.
The bulk of the letter points out that these two populations
are largely nonviolent and low-risk, and would be better served
in community-based rehabilitative programs.
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