Fresno, CA Homeless and the Hacienda State Prison?

[annm4peace]

The goal of a Police State in Fresno, CA continues

http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/01/31/18476199.ph...

A proposal for a 400 bed privately operated state prison has been made for central Fresno at the site of the old Hacienda Hotel (Clinton and highway 99). On January 30, during mayor Alan Autry’s “Truth on the Table” community meeting, he heard what the neighboring residents thought of the idea. The result was an example of grassroots democracy in action.

Hacienda State Prison?
By Mike Rhodes

Carissa Phelps ( http://www.carissaproject.com / ) got it right when she warned the community that if they did not act fast, a private corporation was going to develop the old Hacienda Hotel into a state prison, complete with razor wire, correctional officers, and high security. Phelps said that some city officials approved of the plan because it would provide some emergency housing for homeless women and it passed the Planning Commission on a 7-0 vote. Going into Wednesday night’s “Truth on the Table” tour, set up by Fresno mayor Alan Autry, the proposal seemed like a slam dunk.

Yolanda Salinas-Bowen was the first resident at the mayor’s meeting, held at the Golden Palace Event Center (across the street from the Hacienda), to complain about the proposal to build a privatized state prison in the neighborhood. She said “from what I heard it is going to be a half way house, a homeless space, there are going to be guards, and 24 hour a day video surveillance. How can you put kids in that facility with barbed wire around the place? Is that a good environment for them to be raised in?”

Autry responded that there was not going to be any razor wire and compared it to the Betty Ford rehabilitation center. He said that the community needed a facility that would take care of the homeless and women who had drug and alcohol problems. Autry seemed to be taking the moral high ground when he argued against NIMBY’ism (Not In My Back Yard) and argued that these people need help and that the facility has to go somewhere.

[annm4peace]

1. From Debbie Reyes.. wish she would run for Mayor

STOP JAIL AND PRISON EXPANSION IN FRESNO COUNTY .PERIOD. COMBINED IT COSTS OUR COUNTY MILLIONS UPON MILLIONS OF DOLLARS, MEANWHILE EVERYBODY ELSE'S BUDGET GETS CUT..THIS IS INSANE AND IMMORAL
Cudos to Carissa for flagging this. We all have to have a watchful eye and a suspicious ear when it comes to our elected official. This proposal came under the disguise of "solving the problem of homelessness". And thank you Mike for sending this out on a Homeless listserve that some of us did not know existed, and now do. I wish we could be at every meeting regarding this stuff. It makes me sick that Councilwoman Cynthia Sterling would have the dishonesty to push this through the commission. Does she know that the high rate of incarcerated are African Americans at 43% and latinos at 30% (statewide). Fresno Co. alone is 80% and the Juvie center the same.

Meanwhile the City is planning other ways to incarcerate poverty, unemployment, mental illness and homelessness with a plan to sink almost a combined 1/2 billion dollars for a New Jail expansion to the recently new jail expansion and and the completion of a 1400 juvenile bed facility just south of West Fresno which has a completion date of 2040, meaning THEY ARE BUILDING BEDS FOR KIDS 2 GENERATIONS AWAY--NOT BORN YET. Also it is located outside an area that suffers from poverty, high unemployment rates ,no library for kids to walk to after school to study. Imagine 1/2 billion dollars spent to revitalize lives with affordable housing, job creation, libraries, schools, the list goes on..

People need to start sending in their comments now to the board of supervisors, city officials, and state, we have petitions for the local jail and juvenile expansion plans and now we will add this one too. Our next meeting is on Feb. 7 at 6pm here at 1055 N. Van Ness Suite C- Metro Ministries Building 1 block south of Olive. Or call 559-266-5901...check out our website http://www.calipmp.org

[annm4peace]

2. Link so you can donate to help stop the prison industry in Fresno

http://www.calipmp.org/donate

People frequently ask us why we choose to fight prison construction. We believe that as long as California is building or expanding jails and prisons, money is being taken away from real investments in our future: education, health care, social services. CPMP has seen over the years that the drive to build more cages as the solution to crime just wastes taxpayer dollars on destructive construction projects and distracts us all from focusing on the root causes of crime in our communities.

This belief is based on a simple truth, that history has proven time and time again: every time prison cells are built, some politician, bureaucrat, or social force makes sure every new cell is filled, and overfilled. In other words, if we build them, we will fill them. And every time these new prisons are built, they don’t produce the results people hope to see.

California has been on a prison-building binge for the past twenty years, averaging one new prison per year. It wasn’t always like that – before 1982, California only built twelve state prisons in its entire history! The largest prison construction project in the country has more than quintupled the number of people locked up in this state, giving California an unfortunate claim to fame: the largest prison population in the world