“No New Jail!” The People’s Voice Won’t be Silenced

By The Grace of The One True and Living God, giving us strength and protection from the time of our Ancestors, over 150 Black, Brown, White and Indigenous people filled the Dr. Eva Doyle Auditorium of our Frank E. Merriweather Library, on May 11th at 6 in the evening. The “No More Jails” event was organized so the community could have the opportunity to say to our County Legislators: “No New Jail!” And despite the agents of the sheriff's office, planted in the audience to try to disrupt our event, the People's Voice was heard. “No New Jail!”

The planning and organization of this event was started by Partnership for The Public Good, Prisoners Are People Too, Inc., Free The People of Western New York with Geo Hernandez and Christian Parre, along with Jerome Wright and Steve Hart of H.A.L.T and Black Love Resists in the Rust, Showing Up for Racial Justice, and students from the U.B. Law Clinic, with Nan Haynes, retired attorney and Reverend Eugene L. Pierce, Executive Board member of P.R.P.2 joining the call. This initiative was the appropriate follow-up to the Community’s push at the Erie County Legislature on May 9th where the community was able to convince our county legislators to put the brakes on the granting of 2.5 million dollars to Sheriff Garcia. Instead, the Sheriff was given $750,000 for a feasibility study that includes input from our community and that is where we are at now; talking about what the community needs and what is feasible in terms of a correction to the problems at the Holding Center and the Alden Correctional Facility.

One of the main agreements that arose during last week’s meeting was that it is not the building, that is the major problem, although we certainly don’t want our people at the Holding Center having to live under the worse conditions. What we discovered again is that the problem is the culture of the jail that has existed from Tim Howard and thirty-two deaths over a period of years with rampant brutality and even sexual abuse to now, with two deaths and continuing brutality under this new sheriff and more charges of sexual abuse. As a result, our concern shifts from the building to the problem of who works in the building. We found, through testimony of a White attorney who regularly goes into the Holding Center, that he sees White deputies walking around sporting their White supremacist tattoos and acting out of that ideology against the Black and Brown prisoners who are mostly kept in the worst parts of the jail.

These are the realities and conversations that need to be had in the “Needs Assessment” for our community to determine how we proceed to ask our legislators to spend any money that should be coming to our community for any kind of problem solving or improvement.

There is much on the table, my people, so please stay tuned and come out and join us at our next community forum at the Merriweather Library. This is your money we are talking about and it is the lives of all of our people, Black, Brown White and others that is at stake. Be an active vocal stakeholder!!!

Dear Community Partners,

As we come to the close of a weekend of remembrance for May 14:

Let our prayers tonight be with the families in our beloved community, Whose circles were tragically broken. Let the voice of Survivor’s trauma and needs be amplified, Even if not by them spoken.

Now that speeches have been given by speakers, And the heavenly choirs have sung. Now that prayers have been offered by preachers, And church bells across the city have rung.

Let us pray for the calm of peace, love, and grace, That they are our bedtime cover.

And as the City of Buffalo returns to a quiet place, Let our humanity continue to bond us to one another.

If we are blessed with the gift of tomorrow, and awaken with morning light, Let us arise with purpose, commitment, vigor, and might.

Transformational change in our community requires perseverance, it will not come overnight.

Let us not rely solely on hope but be strengthened to tirelessly fight.

Let us be intentional and deliberate, As there is much planning and work to be done still.

Let us remember ..“Power concedes nothing without demand. It never did and it never will.”

-Frederick Douglas