women the prison that has them and
Gardens perception number one mmm who
goes to prison usually we think about
hardened criminals and people who don’t
care about society everybody know this
does this show right oranges in your
black it gives you a different
perception of what kind of people go to
prison it makes you realize that anybody
can end up in prison it is true that
there are a lot of people who do
terrible things they go to prison and
who don’t deserve to be in society but
more often than not people are like you
and I have you ever texted while driving
we heard about some stories today have
you ever had one too many drinks before
going home I saw a lot of you at the
winery last night the point is we all
make mistakes some of us get caught some
of us don’t some of us get judged for it
and others don’t get judged for it
perception number two if you don’t want
to go to prison then you just don’t do
crimes right we’re a product of our
environment one of the first women that
I worked with I have a Correctional
Institution for Women told me that when
she was 11 years old her father taught
her how to make meth in the kitchen
while she was babysitting for younger
sisters what did your parents teach you
when you were 11 does it happen anything
too
before you spend you like to do today
when I was 11 my mom taught me head
guard this is not a picture of my mom
and icarly because we wouldn’t have had
time to stop and take a picture and we
probably would have had tools quite that
nice my dad let me build things I’ve
scrap wood and roofing nails because
they were easier to hit a hammer with
but we’re products of our environment
and the things that we’re taught to do
as children are often the things that we
carry through our lives and if children
are taught how to make drugs or sell
drugs or use drugs or fats if I see
that’s often what they’ll spend in the
lecture me perception number three
justice treats everyone equally
unfortunately that’s not the case black
women are six times more likely than
white linen to be sentenced to prison so
there’s been a huge jump in
incarceration rate since the 1990s war
on drugs that specifically targeted
communities of color and we see here
that since 2008 the economic recession
there’s been a load decrease so when we
run out of money we’re okay with letting
people out of prison the u.s.
incarcerate a larger percentage of its
population than any other country in the
world there’s been a seven hundred
percent increase of women incarcerated
between 1980 and 2014 perception number
five women who go to prison mothers who
go to prison leap innocent children
behind this was actually true sadly most
of the women well 80% of the women
incarcerated our mothers sadly when they
leave to go to prison they leave
innocent children behind they may leave
them in the care of a grandmother or an
aunt they may leave them in the care of
social services either way there are
children who are without their lovers
and oftentimes without their fathers we
know that when children
witness their parents being arrested and
they feel the void of their parents
being incarcerated they perform poorly
in school they act out they have
aggressive behaviors and when they act
out in school their label is bad they’re
sort of oftentimes cast aside in society
they’re not taken care of this is one
step closer to prison for them than it
is to a college degree what does all of
this have to do partly well this is what
we love to do if any of you who’ve
gardened with a child you know they’re
fascinated when they see a carrot come
out of the ground and realize that
that’s where they come from not the
grocery store loser if you have
teenagers I suspect a member do then you
know when it’s time for a difficult
conversation they don’t want to look you
in the eye so the garden provides
positive natural distractions birds bees
butterflies coloring colorful flowers
vegetables to pick and eat it’s an
opportunity for something positive in a
surrounding that is otherwise not it’s
an opportunity to have a positive
conversation and activity with the most
important person this brings us to
perception number five printed prisons
should punish and tax taxpayers should
not pay for their treatment
unfortunately unfortunately that is it
true there’s so much research that shows
that programming in prison lowers
recidivism rates for example at the Iowa
Correctional Institution for Women where
Julie and I work women who have been
through intensive programming have are
twice less likely to go back to prison
than women who haven’t gone through
those programs first of all it cost
$30,000 a year to keep somebody in
prison of those people 25 percent will
go back to prison within five years
their release think about how much money
that is for US taxpayers yet we know
that programming lowers those rates so
it’s actually saving us money to pay for
programming inside prison secondly 95%
of the women who are in prison will go
back to their communities after their
term is over
that’s your communities my communities
we’ll be neighbors we’ll shop in the
same stores how do you want these people
to be treated when they were locked away
in prison
number three 85% of women who are in
prison are incarcerated for drug-related
convictions a lot of them were victims
before they created victims a lot of
them suffered from traumatic experiences
physical mental emotional and/or sexual
abuse a lot of them have to cope with
these abuses and traumas and do it the
only way they can self-medicating and
relying on their addictions all this to
say we need to focus more on programming
and diversion rather than spending more
on putting more people in prison the
Department of Corrections and I always
actually really progressive and
innovative when it comes to programming
but they can’t shoulder all the cost of
it that it takes to program all this
especially now with state budget cuts
hello senators so um but it takes a
village right it takes a community to
support everybody all the citizens
everybody who lives in Iowa especially
those that have fallen through the
cracks so it’s not just the Senators at
the top who decide how the budget is
spent it’s also you as an individual
what are you going to do to take care of
your fellow community perception number
six prisons should not be pretty this is
a typical men’s prison this is from the
Iowa State
century for Madison many women are
housed in men’s facilities or facilities
that formally house men we need a gender
specific approach and that’s the
approach that the state of Iowa is
taking the image on your left is the
former mental health unit at the Iowa
Correctional Institution for Women
notice the green lighting the rubber bed
the stainless steel toilet this is a
segregation the image on your right is
the new mental health unit at the Iowa
Correctional Institution for Women
notice the natural lighting the windows
plants those plans in there as it turns
out people don’t get better here they do
get better when they have access to
perception number seven gardens are a
luxury not the case Gardens in fact our
necessities in a book called defiant
gardens scholar Kenny Hoff and States
gardens domesticate and humanize
dehumanized situations they offer a way
to reject suffering and inherent
affirmation and sign of human
perseverance in contrast to war or
incarceration Gardens assert the dignity
of life human and non-human and
celebrated gardens are restorative they
provide us outside the prison with a
connection to nature and other people
but think about people who are in prison
when they garden they’re connected to
the outside world that thing’s greater
than themselves that go beyond the
fences that they’re surrounded with
Gardens offer hope and gardens are
therapeutic the landscapes that were
designed by the Iowa State landscape
Department and the garden crew offer a
lots of spaces of Hope and relaxation
and places of solitude in a place where
you’re never alone and gardens are
therapeutic in that they bring down
heart disease they lower blood pressure
they reduce stress and mental fatigue
and they provide respite
the women and a place where being alone
finding solitude is a rare occurrence
gardening is community this is our group
probably a funny combination of people
right in fact putting together students
and incarcerated women has been
incredibly powerful now the day goes by
when we don’t talk about pop culture or
food or our favorite topic it’s hairs
hairstyles when we’re in the garden were
equal we’re one team or one group we
don’t know socioeconomic status race
boundaries all those things go away and
gardening is ordering and in a book
called the meaning of Gardens author
Mark Francis and Randy Hester posit
ordering is the way that we get the
various aspects of our lives into the
right places or at least into places
that we can comprehend and accept and
upon which we can act the women have no
control whether who’s in their told when
to sit stand eat what to wear where to
be where to go when they’re in the
garden we give them control they decide
what to plan what to harvest what to
grow gardening is nurturing most of us
chase bunnies out of our Gardens the
women welcome them the chance to nurture
another living being a replacement for
the mother in that they’re missing at
and the gardens are changing lives in a
recent survey we asked the women how
does spending time in the garden affect
you seventy percent so that makes it
easier for them to deal with conflict
and seventy percent said that they feel
like they can be successful over 80
percent said it can relax and calm then
when we partnered up with our Department
of Corrections Ward and walk Endora said
to us I want calm women she saw the
power of the gardens as an opportunity
to provide a calming environment a stark
contrast from the interior spaces eighty
percent of them said it positively
impacts their mental and physical
well-being and motivates them to change
perception number eight growing food is
for farmers and hippies my favorite
perception right because I think I fall
into both of those molds but I have a
lot of friends who don’t fall into those
molds and who believe that gardening is
empowering everybody should know how to
grow food in prison the high blood
pressure rates in diabetes rates doubled
between 2004 and 2012 we know that a
healthy diet can help curb those rings
however it’s really expensive to eat
healthy food and the kitchen staff here
at I CI W they have to work with a
budget of under three dollars per day
per person think about it
what can you eat ramen noodles that’s
pretty much what they eat about it so
growing their own food is a way as a
sustainable way to provide an access to
healthy health healthy nutritious diet
this is a picture of the garden so the
women earn gain gardening skills that
they can come bring back home with them
to share with their children with their
mothers their grandparents some of them
have found jobs in a growing
horticulture industry in Iowa and others
learn general job skills making
compromises sticking to commitments
making group decisions and resolving
conflicts you and I at the end of the
day even if we’ve had a terrible day in
worker Mabel super irritating we get to
go home and forget about them these
women they have to live together 24/7 so
think about conflict management in those
situations perception number nine
incarcerated people are lazy and
ungrateful again couldn’t me more
opposed to the truth the women were so
happy to grow food for their fellow
inmates even the ones they didn’t get
along with they were proud and happy
also last summer they decided to donate
over a thousand pounds of vegetables to
the local food bank because they believe
that the people who went to the food
bank deserved it
more than they did if this is not just
about prisons needing Gardens this is
about prisons needing all of us it’s
important that we share what we love and
what we know be it poetry
personal finance photography life skills
music anything that you love cooking you
love and you know and you want to share
it takes a community to help the people
who have fallen through the cracks of
our society I don’t know what Prison
Reforms should look like but I know the
answer starts with loving and caring about each other more thank you