SITTING IN MY CELL at San Quentin Rehabilitation Center on the fifth tier in North Block, trying to keep cool underneath my 8-inch plastic fan, suddenly I hear an explosion.
My fan stops spinning. All the lights go out. The backup generator has exploded. After 15 minutes, my body starts heating up. I take off as much clothing as I can without becoming indecent. My skin warms and I perspire. My heart starts to beat faster and faster. After 30 minutes, I stand by the cell bars to see if any air is there. There isn’t.
Temperatures soar when the power goes out, especially in the summer. The ventilation system has long been broken and all the windows are welded shut. The heat rises quickly, 90-100 degrees. When the power goes out, all you can do is pray and take slow deep breaths.
“The problem with (being) locked down inside a cell that’s extremely hot is that you literally can barely go to sleep because literally, the wall is sweating,” said Noire Wilson, an incarcerated individual at San Quentin. “It’s so hot you definitely feel your body going through something.”
San Quentin’s cells are like miniature ovens with two 98.6-degree bodies locked inside each one of them. The higher up you’re housed, the less air you’re likely to feel. The fifth tier can be like a sauna. There is no cold water, ice or air conditioning.
North Block has 400 cells, five tiers, and five flights of stairs. The building houses up to 800 incarcerated individuals. It’s a concrete and steel community of the young, the elderly, disabled, mentally and physically ill. Some use oxygen machines. Some use insulin. Others have chronic ailments such as kidney disease, cardiovascular disease or high blood pressure. Lots of people here take psychotropic medications.
As climate change intensifies, California will experience more frequent extreme heat. This climate hazard will have the greatest impact on vulnerable populations, including people with underlying health conditions and minimal financial resources, many who happen to be in prison.
Not vulnerable in the eyes of the state
Since 2022, the state has adopted new measures to protect vulnerable communities during extreme heat conditions. But the incarcerated population is not defined by the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services as a vulnerable population requiring protection.
According to a first-of-its-kind report by the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights and the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, “Hidden Hazards: The Impacts of Climate Change on Incarcerated People in California State Prisons,” the vulnerabilities of people currently incarcerated in California state prisons are of urgent concern. Climate change and extreme heat threaten 18 different prisons.
“When we look at the impacts of climate change on our planet and within our communities, the research does not incorporate the impact on people living inside prisons. California has experienced extremely high temperatures in the past decade and wildfires that have destroyed entire communities,” said Maura O’Neill, a co-author of “Hidden Hazards.”
“During these extreme climate hazards, our findings show that incarcerated people do not receive the protection or preparedness they need in these uncertain situations. They are solely dependent on the action, and lack of action, of prison staff and CDCR,” O’Neill said.
Last summer, at least 41 incarcerated individuals died in Texas prisons during a record-breaking heat wave. State and local agencies did not respond to the climate hazards in those prisons. This prompted Democrats to call for a congressional investigation.
“Here at San Quentin we have been experiencing extreme heat in the summer time. Sometimes the heat may last for weeks at a time. And to make things worse, the staff don’t let us get ice water from the kitchen nor do they turn the air conditioning on,” said an anonymous respondent in a survey in the “Hidden Hazards” report.
Nearly 600 people currently incarcerated at California’s 34 prisons answered surveys from UCLA researchers, examining the intersections of climate change, environmental justice, and the carceral system. The report outlines the lack of climate disaster preparedness plans by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
At least 57 percent of incarcerated individuals who participated in the surveys at San Quentin have experienced extreme heat, according to O’Neill.
“There has been multiple times when the power and generator have failed from heat waves and I have suffered asthma attacks and passed out to sleep. These power outages are often at night when we are locked in our cells. The heat regularly reaches 90-100 degrees from April to November and there is no plan even to hand out ice,” said another survey respondent.
“If we could have access to some ice water during the hot temperature over 90 degrees it probably will help a little, because inside buildings without AC or any type of cold air, there are just too many people inside the building,” said another respondent.
There’s a plan for that
According to the CDCR, there is an extreme heat prevention plan. Each prison has a heat plan coordinator, who monitors heat-related conditions, During extreme heat, access to indoor recreation facilities, water stations, fans, portable cooling units, ice, and air conditioning, and even additional showers are made available. Opening housing unit cell windows is also an option at some prisons.
But while CDCR’s emergency heat plan may exist on paper, many incarcerated people dispute its implementation. In fact, in 2010 CDCR created a water conservation plan in response to the California drought emergency. That plan limited incarcerated people’s access to showers, put shutoff valves on showers for officers to control; and turned off outdoor showers.
Many water fountains were turned off and ice is now restricted to the most extreme medical or mental health needs. Also, some CDCR prisons or housing units may have air conditioning, but not North Block.
The years 2017-20 marked some of the worst years for Northern California. Whole towns were lost because of historic wildfires fueled by sweltering heat waves. Air quality got so bad from smoke that it led to canceling outdoor events. Sheltering in place became a thing before 2020. Then more wildfires fueled by extreme weather conditions hit the region that year.
The Hidden Hazards report points out that eight of the 10 warmest years on record occurred between 2012 and 2022. The 2022 10-day summer heat wave was the hottest and worst heat wave ever recorded in the state’s history. Temperatures reached 125 degrees in Death Valley and 100 degrees in San Francisco, where it is normally mild. Soon thereafter, San Francisco created its own heat emergency response plan.
Gov. Gavin Newsom only recently lifted the drought emergency in California in 2023. But the state is still being required to conserve water during rising temperatures, which affects restrictions in prison.
While most people in the world are free to go to a beach or someplace cool when a heat wave comes or they have the option of ice and cold water, the goal of prison is to punish people, making their life miserable, inconvenient and uncomfortable. But climate change is turning the usual prison discomforts into torture, hospitalization and death.
“There’s no escaping the elements in prison,” said O’Neill. “On top of this, access to infrastructure that was meant to keep people cool, warm, or dry, was never a guarantee. A facility lockdown can interfere with access to air conditioned spaces and endanger people.”
A potential solution
San Quentin has yet to hear expert warnings from the University of San Francisco and UC Berkeley to fix the ventilation systems and open the windows in the prison’s housing units.
Since the pandemic that started in 2020 led to the death of 28 people from COVID-19, prison officials have done nothing but open a door to let the air inside, creating another problem — pigeon infestations. Since 1983, judges have been unable to convince San Quentin or CDCR to fix the living conditions.
But there is now a solution to ward off a deadly heat related disaster. An advisory council hand-picked by Newsom recommended that the governor slash by at least a third the cost of a $360 million project to remake San Quentin, and use the saved money to improve living conditions at the facility. A Public Works Board recently greenlit this project to begin in April. Money is available to fix the ventilation in North Block and open the windows and repair other parts of the prison infrastructure.
Researchers from UCLA have also made several recommendations on how to respond to climate change, including reducing the size of California’s incarcerated population by 50,000, closing more prisons vulnerable to climate hazards, and updating the state of California emergency plan to recognize the vulnerability of incarcerated people.
The researchers also recommended reallocating funding to expand air conditioning, ventilation shade and backup generators at prisons where they’re needed.
However, this last proposal faces serious opposition. The state Department of Finance and Newsom recently objected to a California Division of Occupational Safety and Health safety board’s move approving new rules for regulating indoor heat in response to climate change.
They say it will cost billions if correctional facilities are included. Now the entire workforce in California may have to suffer along with the incarcerated population if Newsom blocks these new regulations.
Being locked inside a cell for eight hours without power, in rising heat conditions, makes me understand why so much public outcry occurred when people locked their dogs and children in hot cars.
Heat becomes incredibly dangerous quickly. I’m 52, asthmatic with high blood pressure and pre-diabetes. Simmering in 90-plus degree temperatures for hours is dizzying. It’s scary knowing that your life is in the hands of someone who doesn’t have a history of exercising care.
But if the state really intends to move forward with the San Quentin Rehabilitation Center and adopt a new “California model” emphasizing rehabilitation, protecting the most vulnerable from climate change and rising heat, including those in prison, must be its top priority.