Inmates in Texas prisons and the correctional officers who work there suffer in unbearable heat each summer because of unregulated temperatures. John Litzler, director of public policy for Texas Baptists’ Christian Life Commission, believes conditions persist because most Texans are unaware.
In spite of broad support in the Texas House of Representatives, a bill to address scorching heat in Texas prisons without air conditioning died in committee in the Texas Senate in the 88th Texas Legislature. When questioned, state senators reported their constituents just don’t care about this issue, Litzler said.
But at a Corrections Committee hearing on a bill to regulate temperatures in Texas prisons, 46 registered as “for” the bill, with 9 of those, including Litzler, providing testimony in support.
Not one person registered or testified against the bill. It was Rep. Terry Canales’ second attempt in a row to get the legislation passed during the legislative session.
Yet, with historic budget surpluses that readily would have funded the preliminary costs of the updates last year, the bill disappeared, and conditions remain untenable, Litzler explained.
Litzler believes most Texas voters—including most Texas Baptists—simply don’t know about conditions in the state’s prisons. But as they learn more, he hopes they will contact elected officials to register their concern.
Conditions for inmates
“We don’t even allow people to treat dogs like this, while we’re doing it to hundreds and thousands of people in Texas,” Canales testified at the March 28 Corrections Committee hearing.
He described being in areas of Texas prisons without air conditioning and sweating through his clothes in under five minutes.
Canales spoke of the dangers caused by fans, to which some inmates have access to while others don’t. The unbearable heat inflames tempers, and violence breaks out over sharing these fans. And the fans are loud, so guards can’t always hear issues over the noise.
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The stench in Texas prisons is so thick it can be tasted, Canales said, due to the hygiene problems that persist when inmates, guards and staff are subjected to hours or days at a time in temperatures exceeding 100 degrees, with extremely limited access to cool showers.
Lawsuits over heat-related injury are regular and costly, not to mention the deaths, Canales stated. He and others providing testimony spoke of inmates flooding toilets intentionally to have a drink or water on the floor in which to cool off a bit.
Many offenders are incarcerated for low-level drug offenses, Canales said. Yet “we’re cooking them. We’re literally cooking human beings.”
Temperatures in Texas prisons contribute to inhumane conditions for inmates and prison staff alike.
Conditions for staff
Clifton Buchanan, representing the American Federation of State and County Municipal Employees and Texas Correctional Employees Council with more than 25 years of corrections experience, testified to the toll conditions take on corrections officers.
He explained while Texas Department of Criminal Justice guidelines require incarcerated people to be given breaks or respite to cool down in air conditioning, no such protections are ensured for officers.
In fact, officers not only don’t get breaks because they are so understaffed, but also can be subject to disciplinary action for missing work due to heat related injury, Buchanan stated.
Michael Webber, who testified because he’d worked as an electrical maintenance supervisor for TDCJ for many years, credited his military years in the Middle East as preparation for work in these conditions—preparation his aging coworkers did not have.
He described other staff being physically unable to handle the heat, so they could not do what needed to be done. Maintenance frequently was completed haphazardly, if at all, in ways that wouldn’t last because it’s all they could manage.
His aging coworkers just could not handle “8, 12, 16 hours a day in that heat,” Webber said. “There’s no relief from it.”
Additionally, Webber described corrections officers, his “peers in grey,” being required to wear layers in the heat—pants and stab vests under long-sleeved uniforms. It was not unusual to see them “fall out on a pretty regular basis,” he continued.
If either staff or inmates passed out due to heat-related injury, operations were suspended to deal with the issue. Webber said these happened so regularly, the slowdowns they caused contributed to the difficulty of completing routine maintenance.
Prior to assuming his role with the CLC, Litzler said, though he was embarrassed to admit it, he was unaware regulating temperatures in Texas prisons wasn’t already required. It is required in county jails.
He said he felt it was important to note this lack of knowledge because even as a lawyer he was unaware. On the rare occasions his legal practice took him to prisons, those visits were in a space with air conditioning. But temperatures in living quarters are not regulated, he explained.
Pushing back against legislators’ claims their constituents didn’t care about the issue, Litzler said many lawyers he knows also were unaware. It’s much more likely, in Litzler’s opinion, that voters just don’t know about the lack of temperature regulation in Texas jails and prisons.
Additional testimony spoke of huge turnover in prison staff (21.9 percent annually), with the heat often cited as a factor in resignations. Forty percent of new corrections officers quit within the first year.
As of two weeks ago, 25 percent of the 24,000 corrections officer positions in Texas remain unfilled. A Sept. 20 article in the Texas Tribune about a TDCJ effort to recruit teenagers fresh out of high school to alleviate the shortage highlights problems related to the lack of air conditioning.
How to help
The inhumane conditions in state prisons and jails spurred Litzler to propose a letter-writing campaign for Texas Baptists to help get temperature regulation legislation finally passed in the next legislative session.
A letter he prepared as a guide can be accessed here. But he emphasized it’s important to adjust the letter so legislators will not view it as a form letter they already received and toss it to the side, which can happen when multiple constituents express support for legislation.
An updated letter example will be provided when the next legislative session begins, referencing numbers for the actual bills being submitted.
Representative and contact information is available at Who Represents Me? As prison temperature regulation bills have passed the House the past two sessions, it’s most important to encourage senators to approve legislation, Litzler said.
Seventy percent of Texas prisons still have no temperature regulation. It’s important to note the bills only have asked for the same limits as county jails—no less than 65 degrees and no more than 85 degrees—which still are not comfortable temperatures, another expert testified.
But these regulations will save lives, ill-health effects and money, according to the experienced people who provided testimony.
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