‘Disaster’ looms at uncooled prisons
Report paints grim picture at state lockups without air conditioning in summer heat
As sweltering heat envelops Texas, a new report from Texas A&M University questions whether state prisons are handling those extreme temperatures effectively and keeping inmates safe.
Researchers from A&M’s Hazard Reduction and Recovery Center, as well as the Texas Prisons Community Advocates group, surveyed 309 incarcerated individuals between June 2018 and 2020. The responses paint a grim picture, with many inmates saying they fear the heat will kill them.
Most Texans have the luxury of cooling off indoors, but not all inmates do. Texas is one of at least 13 states without universal air conditioning in state prisons, the report states.
“With our prisons not having air conditioning, it’s a really dangerous situation,” said J. Carlee Purdum, a research assistant professor at A&M. “When we have a heat wave such as this summer, it can potentially lead to disastrous consequences.”
Temperatures inside prisons have been shown to regularly reach 110 degrees, according to the report, with at least one unit topping 149 degrees.
At least 79 incarcerated people and prison staff reported heat-related illnesses from January to October 2018, the report states. Since 1998, TCDJ has recorded at least 23 heat-related deaths.
“Every summer I battle with heat rash and it’s maddening,” one inmate wrote in the report.
Another said he fainted four times in a cell without any medical attention offered or report filed.
Between September 2019 and August 2020, 6,341 grievances were filed specific to heat-related issues, according to the report.
According to the TPCA survey, one third of participants reported having filed at least one heat-related grievance, and the majority of participants who filed a grievance contested the initial response by filing a second grievance. A significant number of participants (16 percent) who had filed a grievance had not yet received a response.
“Grievances are futile, a waste of time,” wrote one inmate from the Stevenson Unit.
Purdum and her co-researchers say the issues are systemic and that the Texas Department
of Criminal Justice’s current policies are “not enough.”
A TDCJ spokesperson said via email Friday that the agency operates 100 facilities across the state, with 31 completely airconditioned, 55 partly air-conditioned and 14 having no A/C.
“We take numerous precautions to lessen the effects of hot temperatures for those incarcerated within our facilities. These efforts work,” said Amanda Hernandez, TDCJ’s director of communications.
Hernandez said the agency has worked to increase the number of cooled beds available over the past few years, adding it also uses an “array of measures to keep inmates safe.” These measures include providing access to ice and water, and “strategically” placing fans in facilities to move the air.
“Each summer we continue to refine and improve our practices,” Hernandez said. “What has not changed is our commitment to do all that we can to keep staff and inmates safe.”
But even getting access to a cooled bed or a cup for water is difficult, inmates said in the report.
“I have heat restrictions through medical and psych due to my health and medications,” wrote one incarcerated woman with serious health vulnerabilities who has struggled to get access to a cooled bed at the nonair conditioned Hobby Unit. “I struggle with the heat so bad … I can’t eat … I can’t gain weight … I suffer from the heat … I get dizzy and headaches … I am weak. I have diarrhea too with leg cramps at night. I have even passed out a few times. I drink plenty of water. They do not allow respite.”
The woman, who reported that she has no family to help her, begged for help with a unit transfer.
Not having a cup to access communally distributed water also creates significant vulnerability to heat-related illness, the report stated, noting in 2012 Larry McCollum, an incarcerated man who died from hyperthermia in the Hutchins State Jail run by TDCJ, did not have access to a cup for water, which must be purchased from the commissary.
Indigent incarcerated people are to be given a cup per TDCJ policy, yet many incarcerated participants reported not having one. In 2019, only a quarter of survey participants reported that they had access to a cup. This proportion increased in 2020, when 62 percent of participants had access to a cup, likely because of lockdowns due to COVID, the report said.
Even with slight improvements and heat-mitigating measures that have been taken at prisons, A&M’s researchers argue the impact of the heat is “wildly underestimated.”
“People don’t understand how much of an issue this is,” Purdum said, “and it has enormous spillover effects for our prison systems and our communities.”
The lack of air conditioning in prisons, especially in housing areas, has previously been argued to be a violation of human rights under the U.S. Constitution, the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act.
In 2019, a federal judge accused the Texas prison system of violating the terms of a settlement in a contentious class-action lawsuit. The judge ordered prison officials to transfer inmates out of a sweltering Beaumont lock-up after a failed cooling system saw indoor temperatures exceed 90 degrees.
The solution to the problem, Purdum says, is to reduce heat exposure in the first place, rather than attempt to reduce its impact. “The only way to really do that at this point is to add air conditioning to the units and bring the temperatures down.”
TDCJ has previously contended it would cost $1 billion to install A/C across all units, according to the report, with an additional $140 million needed annually for utilities and maintenance.
“We’re not talking about a luxury — it’s a necessity,” Purdum said. “Especially in months like this when we’re going through these extreme heat waves. We’re talking about a human right — the right to live and the right to be in a safe place.”