People are sent to prison for breaking the law. But prisons have laws also, and the prison staff is obligated to follow those laws. For example, the law has clearly established that prisoners are to get a minimum of five hours of out-of-cell exercise per week, in order to keep their bodies healthy. Exercise is one of the rights given under the Eighth Amendment to the U. S. Constitution. This is to prevent cruel and unusual punishment where the conditions of confinement cause the body to deteriorate.
Yet today, once again, the gym and yard lines were cancelled. This happens a lot here at Shawnee Correctional Center, often with no reason given.
Each day the schedule lists the cellhouse as having an out-of-cellhouse activity for exercise. It states that we are scheduled to get from 8:10 a.m. to 9 a.m. on the morning run. When we do get activity, usually we only get twenty-five of the fifty minutes scheduled. This due to the staff not doing their required job—basically the warden turns a blind eye to the daily laziness of his staff. He condones the act. If you file a grievance about this, it will be lost, or not answered correctly.
The gym line in the morning is the last line to be run out of the building. At 8:15 to 8:20 the line will leave. Then it is held up on the walk outside the building for another five minutes to have a line-movement officer check the inmates’ movement sheet. At around 8:20 to 8:26 a.m. one will finally reach the gym. Then at 8:45 a.m. the line is terminated and run back to the cellhouse to prepare for lunch to be served. So at the most we only get twenty-five to thirty minutes a day.
The yard lines are scheduled for fifty minutes a day too. But here is the routine. Scheduled at 12:25 p.m. to 1:15 p.m. Run at 12:30 to 12:35. Then terminated at 1:05 p.m. Scheduled at 1:25 to 2:15. Run at 1:35 to 2 p.m.
At 25 minutes each day, and hoping that you get it each day, which is not the case, you have this equation.
7 x 25 minutes = 175 minutes. This is 2 hours and 55 minutes a week, not the five hours that is required by law.
Then we have the commissary (prison store) situation. The soy-based diet is still being fed to the men prisoners. (Not the women—they no longer give the soy diet to the women because it stopped their menstrual periods.) So the men mostly eat food they buy at the prisoner commissary.
The system is set up with four windows to run each day. But rarely are all four manned. Three at best are staffed on a good day.
In principle, we should be allowed to shop at the commissary once a week. The warden has placed a $150 spend limit on food and supplies. Electronic items and clothing are not to be included in this total.
Food at the commissary is expensive. One 8-ounce package of pork is $4. Chicken meat is $4 for 10 ounces. We pay $4 for a package of roast beef. You are allowed to get four of each per week. So you buy four chicken, four pork, four roast beef, and four BBQ beef you are already at around $65. With paper, pens, envelopes, chips, rice and beans, mashed potato mix, etc., you quickly reach your limit
However, we rarely shop once a week because the staff is too lazy and inept to let two thousand prisoners shop weekly. Instead, we have to stretch our food for two to three weeks. For example, in November I shopped twice. But most guys only shopped once. I was lucky in the schedule, getting November 7th, and November 22nd. Still it was a fifteen-day span between shops with a weekly limit in place. And remember, most of us just cannot eat the soy-laden meals—they make us very sick. So if we don’t get to shop weekly, we starve.
As a law-abiding citizen, you may be asking yourself, “Why should I care whether the prisoner gets to shop?” The taxpaying citizen should care because it affects the taxes he or she pays. The taxpayer foots the prison budget every week. The prison commissary returns 60 percent of the profits to the prison budget. So you have a vested interest in seeing those four windows open and all the prisoners shopping every week. More spent in the commissary means less taxpayer money allocated to the prison budget.
Then you have the fact the soy diet is high in estrogen and carcinogens. This diet is making the men sick. So their families send in money so their loved-ones can eat. This is a win-win situation for the cash-strapped state of Illinois.
There are 432 men in a house. You have four houses. But for some reason the prison employees—one for every two prisoners— cannot get the job done each week. The budget is in place for the commissary to be open every day, and all four cash registers ringing sales.
Now not every man shops each week. Many only have enough money to shop once or twice a month. So lines move quickly when the commissary is open as it should be.
Another thing: the prison used to supply writing supplies and toiletries each month, but no longer. Instead, prisoners get a stipend of $10 a month to buy writing supplies and cosmetics. But if the store is open only infrequently, and the prisoner somehow misses a day when he can shop, he may have to go without these things—which formerly he could count on.
Each day the store runs from 7 to 3 p.m. But the lines do not run bodies until 8:30 a.m. and they stop at 1:30 p.m. each day. So let us do a little math on the early day.
1 hour and thirty 30 minutes each day when employees do not work in the store times 5 days equals 7 ½ hours each week of afternoon down time. Nice afternoon break costing the tax payer a nice piece of change each week, as these employees make around $40 an hour to ring out sales.
But most days there is only one or two windows open. The staff required to be ringing out sales is missing in action. Another problem the warden turns a blind eye to.
Now today started the second run of deer hunting season in Illinois. So we are on denial of most every service due to shortness of staff. No commissary food for us—too many men out hunting.
I just want the public to see the service they are getting for their buck taken in wages for these employees. Questions? Please send them in and I will answer them.
Until next time remember: it is your money that runs this prison system. You have a right to demand better for your state taxes paid each week. Equal speech with equal taxes applied. Was there not a Boston Tea Party held over this issue?
