BRING BACK CARE PACKAGES

On April 25, 2022, New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision's (NYSDOCCS) Acting Commissioner (AC) Anthony Annucci promulgated a statewide package pilot program. The plan's alleged goals are to reduce "overdoses, violence, and [supposedly improve] overall rehabilitation of the population." Objectively, the plan could reduce the introduction of contraband leading to overdoses. Possibly, it may reduce violence related to contraband. It will definitely reduce the rehabilitation of the overall population. Contraband will become more exclusive thereby increasing its value.

Violence and drug abuse is a concern in any society, at large or incarcerated. Our main focus around these issues, however, should lean toward seeking out the root causes of violence and drug abuse. The pilot program doesn't give any thought to that.

During the pandemic, the incarcerated were estranged from their loved ones. The current visitation policy continues to exacerbate distance between residents and loved ones, especially children. Early terminations, long lines, and delays discourage visitors. Children have nothing to engage them or connect them to their incarcerated loved one.

Many residents and loved ones died during the pandemic. Grief counseling has not been afforded to residents. Memorial gatherings have been denied also.

NYSDOCCS has not allowed ancillary violence and substance abuse reduction/treatment programs to enter their facilities even in the alleged rise of violence and drug abuse. This causes speculation. I raise the question: Is this in reaction and retaliation to passing the HALT Law?

The prison population doesn't feel safe. The prison population doesn't feel heard. As Martin Luther King Jr. said, "Violence is the voice of the oppressed." The oppressed learn this language from oppressors. Usually, oppressors control the narrative.

NYSDOCCS aggregates data around violence, contraband, and drug abuse. They have an interest in what is reported. Their objective is to paint "We good, they bad" images.

Because NYSDOCCS controls the data, they control the narrative. They can prove, through reports, how many residents were revived, how many packages received contained contraband, and how many fights/assaults have taken place before, during, and after visitation was suspended.

Has anyone taken a look at those numbers? You can access them through NYSDOCCS' FOIL Office. Quite possibly, they may not be as alarming as they are projected to be. We should seek out ecumenical information.

Evidence is the key to negotiations or winning an argument. At this point, I don't know if we can argue or negotiate. If we have sound reasoning based on facts we can argue. If we have reasonable concerns we can negotiate.

Either way, what are we asking for? We would like for things to remain the way that they are, right? On the opposite side of that coin, as a devil's advocate, I would say that you don't care about the flow of drugs entering correctional facilities that result in overdoses and violence.

As a comprehensive compromise, how can we get what we want and aid in the reduction of contraband flow, compromise. Would anyone be adverse to requesting that 20lbs of the 40lbs could come directly from home brought to the facility each month?

This would reduce the volume of the most suspect packages, according to NYSDOCCS. It would allow families to avoid shipping costs, shop in their communities, provide a large variety of fresh produce, provide products in accordance with dietary needs, and easily provide support to their loved ones.

In this effort, we should include the reintroduction and expansion of therapeutic volunteer anti-violence and substance abuse treatment programs, and expansion of visiting room space to 50% capacity. In this way, we show we care about the holistic wellbeing of community members and residents.

This written document is in direct response to DOCCS memorandum concerning Department Directive #4911 packages and articles received through facility package rooms. The recommendation for this initiative was a direct result of the work of the Prison Violence Task Force, which was created last year to stymie alleged upticks in violence and promotion of contraband into correctional facilities.

On the surface, it appears, this memorandum is a direct retaliation to prison advocacy groups like HALT who have highlighted the inhumane conditions men and women experience while in prison. Which in turn has disarmed punitive praxis, such as long-term solitary confinement and long term keep locks as methods of unwritten correctional methods of control.

The new memorandum states: “Upon complete implementation, packages and articles will only be allowed to be received directly from vendors via U.S. Postal Service, FedEx, UPS, etc. Packages will no longer be allowed to be brought to the facility during visits or mailed directly to the facility from family or friends. Department Directive #4911 – Packages & Articles Sent to Facilities – is in the process of being updated.”

How does this maintain security and safety for both staff and the incarcerated population? Visitation packages are a vital component to sustain the physical, mental, and emotional stressors that encompass correctional confinement. DOCCS currently houses approximately 30,000 people today, most are under-nourished and unable to maintain their upkeep with hygiene without the ability to purchase quality products.

In January 2018, DOCCS began a pilot program restricting packages to people confined to correctional institutions, forcing family members to buy overpriced items from prison industry vendors. Today, May 2022, the same thing is happening yet again. Retail chains like Walmart, Target, Costco, Western Beef, Shoprite, Stop and Shop will not ship directly to prisons. This in turn compels family members and people housed in prisons to utilize the original six vendors DOCCS attempted to implement in concert with directive #4911A five years ago.

The ambiguous language within the new DOCCS memo: “a vendor” knowing fully well most retail stores many family members frequent will not ship to prisons is a blatant attempt to circumvent the reasoning the governor repealed defunct directive #4911A in 2018.

Packages purchased through vendors will be more expensive. The increasing costs for families who are already financially struggling places additional stress on the family dynamic already fractured because of incarceration. Moreso, DOCCS compounds carceral immiseration by paying men and women pennies an hour. Simply put, people rely on outside support to supplement a lack of nutrition in prison.

Spap-shot / Op-ed
Blow Back For HALT Law: Or Genuine Way to Halt Violence?

April 25, 2022

The DOCCS "MEMORANDUM" dated "April 25, 2022" reads " As a result of increase violence and overdoses due to the introduction of contraband through the package room," it goes on to say changes will be implemented, which results in approvrded vendor food packages, only (with the exception of two home-non-food-packages a year).

Every day, over 30,000 incarcerated folks languish in New York State prisons, 75% of them are Black and Brown people.

9,000 incarcerated people in New York state are facing possible "life", if not paroled: 55.8% are Black and 24.7% are Hispanic / Latinx.

I've spoken to a few Latinx people, they are concerned that their family members don't use technology, much or at all. Others family live out of state/country and the package is the only source of support they are afforded. Many, Black and Brown are concerned about their exorbitant court fees, and the undue burden of their loved ones will have with sending enough money for the fee(s) and food-to-be-order from the approved vendor(s).

According to the Census Bureau in 2020, the average non-Hispanic black median household income was $43,771 in comparison to $71,664 for non-Hispanic white household. In 2021, the US Census Bureau reports 21.2 percent of non-Hispanic blacks in comparison with 9.0 percent of non-Hispanic whites were living at poverty level. In 2021, the unemployment rate for non-Hispanic blacks was twice that of non-Hispanic whites (7.7 percent and 3.7 percent, respectively).

Societal inequalities illuminates the wealth divides amongst New Yorkers. For some, paying a court fee is a mater of pulling out their Visa, American Express, checkbook (if any still exist), or cash (for us Luddites). For those or their families who struggle with providing the daily necessities, it can be a bit more complicated.

Others say that their families pick up things that remind them of home, of familial bonds, heritage and love. Many guys think that without there being subtle reminders that "this place" is not the final stop, but a "a place for now," what is there to keep them grounded? A package is more than the fresh fruit, better quality food, or snacks: it's that hug that some mothers/fathers can't afford to come and give in person.

I do believe this is further blow back against Senator Julia Salazar's HALT bill. Violence is up in society, just as well as overdoses, imprisoned people are not "socially dead" because they are sitting in cages. Uncertainty mixed with hopelessness, and mental health issues add to violence an uptick in overdoses. This idea to provided food-packages from vendors only, isn't a new bill. It was brought up some years back, there was an expose about it in the New York City papers, and it sort of went away, until now that is. Why does appear to be a good idea now?

Perhaps for some, seeing big corporations, or approved venders, continue to suck the few little resources from BIPOC communities, as a good idea, it is anything but. And perhaps depersonalizing every aspect of people's lives, who are already soicially deprived appears to be a great idea, but that is not either. My twenty year of incarceration, and throughcountless administrations-both doccs and governors informs me that implemented plan will not slow down drugs in prison, use of drugs leading to overdoses, or halt violence.

But, it will drive up the numbers of violence, then that will justify readjusting the HALT law, which will return more Black/Brown bodies into these S.H.U.s, in these otherwise desolate upstate areas that are having to close, because people's psychological (diagnosed and non) issues are no longer able to be exploited by long term keep-lock and months/years in special housing.

You take away peoples "hope" there ain't much else left for them to lose. Take people few little joys, and they'll find someway else to "feel" joy. But when you disconnect isolated people from their loved ones, after so many of population has already lost loved ones--to COVID-19 and so on, well that likely isn't the best option to be explored.

For my entire adult life, I’ve been haunted by a family history of heart disease. My father and uncle died of massive heart attacks at ages 46 and 27. I’ll turn 29 this year, and though that means I’m fortunate enough to have outlived my uncle, the premature deaths in my family are a constant reminder that my biological clock is ticking way too fast.

Last year, my health status nearly boiled over into a full-blown crisis. I was incarcerated at New York’s Fishkill Correctional Facility at the time, serving out the last year of my prison sentence. Even though I was exercising daily, doing my best to watch my diet, and taking two different medications, my blood pressure peaked to the highest level it has ever reached.

Although I had learned how to avoid certain risk factors, prison deprived me of the ability to make the changes I would need to do so. I wanted to do more, but I felt like there was nothing I could do to defuse the time bomb in my chest. There was simply no way to avoid the harmful and pervasive prison conditions that were contributing to my spiking blood pressure. This is the reality of incarceration: When you’ve been stripped of your freedom, agency, and choice, it can be impossible to make the “right” decisions.

Months earlier, I had decided to make a drastic dietary change by cutting out processed carbs and animal protein and eating as much fresh produce as possible. Basically, I wanted to become vegan. But I quickly realized how unrealistic that would be while incarcerated.

Prisons are food deserts. Mess-hall meals typically contain very little nutritional value, and most commissaries offer few, if any, fresh food options. Most people in prison don’t have access to fresh fruits and vegetables unless their families bring or send them. It’s hardly a sustainable option. While I was in prison, families were allowed to send their incarcerated loved ones two packages each month, totaling 35 pounds. Many of our families are financially strapped and can’t afford to send enough fresh produce to support a vegetarian or vegan diet, but even if money weren’t an issue, the care packages wouldn’t be enough to keep you nourished year-round. But they were something.

The poor access to good-quality food forced me to make hard decisions while I was incarcerated. I received my first misbehavior report for possessing what the prison labeled “contraband.” It was vegetables from the mess hall that were about to be composted. I was in Upstate Correctional Facility then, and the commissary had no fresh food options. I had just arrived at the facility and didn’t have much to eat in my cell. I was faced with a stark choice: go hungry or break the rules. This is still the only way that most people can get fresh food in prison. You have to steal it or pay someone to steal it for you. What would you do?

Each facility makes up its own rules about what foods it provides, which means the availability varies drastically from prison to prison. Eventually, I was moved to Franklin Correctional Facility, where there were better options and it was possible for me to maintain a lacto-ovo vegetarian diet. The commissary there sold fresh potatoes and carrots and a frozen stir fry that contained a variety of vegetables and mushrooms. Bananas were 18 cents—which is not as cheap as it sounds, considering that the starting wage of an incarcerated worker in New York is just 16 cents an hour. More importantly, the prison gave prisoners access to fridges, so when I got fresh produce in a package from home, it would last more than three days. It was the best a vegetarian could ask for under the circumstances.

While Franklin may have been better for my diet, the environment at the prison taxed my health in other ways. Violence is the norm at Franklin: both prisoner-on-prisoner and officer-on-prisoner. The incessant brutality forced me to live in a constant state of vigilance. I could barely sleep because I had seen people get cut, stabbed, or doused in hot water while they slept. Certain officers turned the threat of violence into a sadistic game—especially if you made eye contact with them.

Eventually, I succeeded in getting transferred to Fishkill Correctional Facility. The conditions there were a marked improvement from those in Franklin. Still, my blood pressure began to creep upward. The commissary at Fishkill was the worst I had encountered. The majority of the food available was empty carbs packed with sugar. There were strict purchase limits on everything—even beans. Most importantly, the commissary offered almost no fresh produce. The closest you could get were raw onions, packaged corn, and fruit cups. I ended up becoming a pescatarian—not by choice but by circumstance.

I was released from prison in February and now have access to a wealth of healthy food. However, if I were still incarcerated, my situation would be worse than ever. In May, the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision launched a new policy prohibiting prisoners from receiving care packages directly from friends and family. Now if people want to give their incarcerated loved ones food or other necessities—like toothbrushes, soap, or undergarments—they have to purchase them through specified external vendors, many of which mark up prices. Families can no longer bring packages on visits. All of this means that people inside have even less access than they did before to fresh foods such as lettuce, spinach, strawberries, and healthy bread. It also means that the cost of sending a care package has soared, because families cannot shop for them at their local supermarkets.

Though my release came before the directive was enacted, I can only imagine what the state of my health would be if I were still inside. I often think about the brothers and sisters I left behind and how they, too, may have the knowledge and the desire to make healthy changes, only to be denied the chance to do so by a cruel new policy that traps them even deeper in a poisonous prison system. I feared for my life while I was incarcerated, and now I fear for theirs. Too many people never make it back home to their families.