FROM CRITICAL RESISTANCE:

After winning our lawsuit to halt construction of the proposed Delano prison, the Court ordered the Department of Corrections (CDC) to redo its environmental impact report AND to accept PUBLIC COMMENT.

NOW IS THE TIME TO TELL THE CDC WHAT YOU THINK ABOUT CALIFORNIA'S PLAN TO BUILD ITS 24TH NEW PRISON IN 20 YEARS! 

The following letter is provided for your use as a sample.  The CDC must receive your letter NO LATER THAN OCT. 1, 2001. PLEASE TAKE A MINUTE to tell the CDC you don't want another prison in Delano.

It is crucial that we all take part in this public comment. Thanks for your support!! Critical Resistance

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California Department of Corrections
Project Development & Management Branch
Facilities & Business Management Division
P.O. Box 942883
Sacramento, CA 94283-0001

ATTN: Susan Hancock California Department of Corrections:

I am writing to express my opposition to the Department of Corrections' plan to build another prison at Delano.

The CDC has not adequately analyzed the impact of the proposed prison. The CDC's new "cumulative impacts environmental analysis" does not meet the standards of California law for the following reasons:

(1) It fails to analyze the impact of several project in the area;
(2) It uses the wrong scale of analysis by failing to consider all significant projects in the area;
(3) It reaches erroneous conclusions that the prison will not significantly impact the area;
and (4) It identifies several unavoidable effects of the prison that are not justified since the CDC offers no overriding consideration that his prison meets any public need.

It is clear that the proposed prison is unnecessary and unwanted.

Sincerely,

YOUR NAME & ADDRESS

TO CONTACT CRITICAL RESISTANCE:
(510) 444-0484 critresist@aol.com
1212 Broadway, Suite 1400 Oakland, CA  94612

ASK SENATOR JOHN BURTON TO STOP CONSTRUCTION OF ANOTHER PRISON IN DELANO, CALIFORNIA

Having successfully stopped the state from breaking ground as planned in February, we are now at a critical moment in the struggle to stop California from building a new 5,000 bed maximum security prison in Delano, California, the home of the United Farm Workers.

Please take a minute to call JOHN BURTON'S office at (415) 557-1300.

Let him know that:

--CALIFORNIA DOESN'T NEED ANOTHER PRISON
The California Department of Corrections is under capacity and it's latest prisoner population projection is 18,000 beds less than their projections of just six months ago.

--WE SUPPORT FUNDING FOR EDUCATION AND REAL COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT NOT MORE PRISONS
Californians have spent $5 Billion over the last twenty years on prison construction, building 23 new prisons but only one new university.

--CALIFORNIANS NEVER GOT TO VOTE ON THE DELANO PRISON
Resisdents of California were never asked to vote on the bonds -- $335 million worth -- for construction of the proposed Delano prison.

For more information about the fight to stop Delano II contact:

Critical Resistance
(510) 444-0484
www.criticalresistance.org
critresist@aol.com

or

The California Prison Moratorium Project
(510) 893-4648 ext. 202
www.prisonactivist.org/pmp
pmpca@usa.net

-- CLICK HERE TO GET A NEW VIDEO ON THE DELANO SITUATION --

BACKGROUND ON DELANO STORY:

Storm Raised by Plan for a California Prison

NEW YORK TIMES

Sunday, August 27, 2000

By  EVELYN NIEVES

DELANO, Calif. --  This aging  farm town has yet to meet the New

Economy and is barely on speaking  terms with the old one. It had

staked its hopes for recovery on the nearby  North Kern State

Prison, but 10 years later, the prison  has not lived up to its

promise of lowering the  town's 26 percent unemployment  rate or

boosting business.

Still, Delano lobbied hard and finally persuaded  state officials

to  build another maximum-security  prison here, right across the

road  from North Kern State.

In a ceremony here  on July 4, Gov.  Gray Davis celebrated the

proposed  $335 million prison as a win-win: an increase in  prison

cells for a system   the California Department of Corrections

describes as 195 percent over  capacity and a tax-and-revenue  boon

for Delano, known  for its lettuce  fields and as the birthplace of

the  United Farm Workers.

But the prison, which would be California's 24th new one since

the  state  began the biggest prison building boom in the nation's

history in  1980, may not be a done deal. The  prospect of yet

another prison has  galvanized groups across the state,  including

prison moratorium advocates,  liberal members of the State

Legislature and  those opposed to the  "three strikes" law.

A coalition of these groups has  sued the state to stop the

prison,  ostensibly on environmental  grounds, but in fact to force

the state  to re-examine its prison building  plans and rethink its

strict policies  limiting  paroles.

The groups contend  that it would be much more beneficial to the

state and offenders if,  instead of incarceration,  the authorities

began pushing treatment for  those convicted of drug use and

mentoring and job opportunities for  young people at risk of going

astray.

The question the coalition is forcing: does California, with a

penal  system larger than that of most countries,  need a new

prison?

The  debate reflects -- and will  surely influence -- a larger one

nationwide over whether  the country  is  building too many

prisons.

The Department of Corrections  and the California Correctional

Peace Officers Association say the  planned 5,000-bed prison is

needed to  help alleviate overcrowding in a system with roughly

161,500 prisoners in  33 prisons. Farming towns like Delano, where

about  half the high school  students go to college, celebrate new

prisons as job centers (though there  is scant evidence that

prisons provide significant employment to local  residents) and as

the means to a bigger tax base.

But those suing to stop the prison  say that the meager benefits

it would  bring to Delano's ailing economy are  no reason to build

an institution that  is superfluous.

They say it is the  result of the Department of Corrections

overestimating projections of  new inmates and underusing  parole

and prison alternative programs.  With the state's  crime rate

dropping  for eight straight years and the prisoner population

dropping  for the first  time in 23 years, the critics say,  there

is no need for yet another state  prison.

"Politicians are trying to wear the  cloak of being tough on crime

to  pander to the fears of voters," said  John Vasconcellos, a

Democratic  state senator, about why the Delano  prison was

approved. "But voters  have repeatedly voted down bonds to  build

new prisons. They want public  safety and leaders that have the

insight and leverage to enhance public safety, but not just by

locking people up and treating them badly and having them come out

worse."

Cal Terhune, the director of the  Department of Corrections, says

that  although the number of prisoners has been leveling off, the

population  projections, based on California's  growth, "would

justify the need for  another facility."

Mr. Terhune says that a dire need  exists for maximum-security

cells  for the most violent offenders. About  9,000 such inmates

are now in cells  with less violent offenders, he said, in  a mix

that has proved volatile.

Don Novey, president of the correctional officers' union, said

that   opponents of the prison had  not factored in that the prison

system,  which he said was  short 2,000  guards, had been

incredibly overcrowded for 30 years.

But Mr. Vasconcellos says the timing of the new Delano prison is

especially bad because of a voter   initiative on the November

ballot,  which is  expected to be approved,  that   demands

alternatives to incarceration for nonviolent offenders charged

with drug possession.

"The governor blackmailed us into  approving it in exchange for

other  things," Mr. Vasconcellos said of the  prison. "The opening

of the second  Delano prison would be contingent on  the Department

of Corrections developing and filling 9,000 therapeutic  drug

treatment beds."

Mr. Davis had asked for two new  prisons, the one in Delano and a

smaller one  in San Diego County;  the Legislature approved only

one.

Prison moratorium groups say the  correctional officers' union,

the most  powerful union in the state and one of  Mr. Davis's major

campaign contributors, is behind pushing the Delano prison through

the Legislature.

They point out that as recently as  December, the state canceled

plans  to build four 500-bed privately run  prisons because

officials like Mr.  Terhune said that the beds were not  needed.

"If the state didn't need 2,000  new beds in December, why does it

need 5,000 new beds now?" said Rose  Braz, program director for the

Critical Resistance in Oakland, which  challenges the proliferation

of prisons and is a main plaintiff in the suit against the Delano

prison

In a projection of prisoner population, the Department of

Corrections  overestimated what the population would be  by Dec.

31, 1999, by 2,648,  according to its figures.

Those fighting the new prison say  that regardless of the reason,

the  figures prove that a new prison is  counterintuitive.

Eric Etelson, of the National Lawyers Guild, another  plaintiff

against  the Delano prison, said that the suit seeks to get to the

root of the prison  population explosion in California.  "What's

fundamentally wrong with  the California prison system is that

it's too big," Mr. Etelson said.  "There are too many people who

shouldn't be in prison who are."

For towns that have staked their  hopes of  rebirth on the

construction  of a  prison and what  it should bring  -- for tax

purposes, all inmates are  considered residents -- the

philosophical debate is about what  a prison will do for the

economy.

Skepticism is growing in these communities. One in three new

prisons built in the state since 1980 are in  the Central Valley,

yet the unemployment rate in the valley remains at  five times the

state average.

And here in Delano, a city of 35,000  residents about 25 miles

from Bakersfield, the answer is decidedly  mixed. Napoleon Madrid,

the mayor,  says that the first prison was supposed to bring jobs

and did not. In  1990, the unemployment rate was the  same as it is

now.

Only 7 percent to 9 percent of the  jobs go to local residents,

the prison's  opponents say, and those are the low-paying service

jobs.

Of the 1,600  jobs projected for the  new prison,  Mr. Madrid  said

that  the Department of Corrections estimated that  only 72 would