CA prisons should be prohibited from suddenly canceling visits

By Victoria Valenzuela, especially for CalMatters

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One July morning last year, I was getting ready to visit my father at the San Quentin Rehabilitation Center when he called me from the prison’s prepaid line. I would be leaving for the 12 o’clock appointment after traveling 415 miles from Los Angeles County.

I picked up the phone. He was silent for a long time.

“I’m so sorry, Mia,” he said.

I asked him what he meant. He told me that a prison official had just announced that visits had been cancelled. The prison was locked.

I refused to accept it. I had traveled so far, spent so much on my flight, shelled out more than $100 bills for the slot machine to feed him, and emotionally prepared myself to see him for six hours a day this weekend, only to be forced to leave and lose him again.

I ordered my Uber to San Quentin not knowing what was going to happen. If they were going to turn me down, they should have told me to my face.

When I went there, that corridor was empty and the door was locked. There was a sign on the door saying that visits were canceled for the day due to changed programming.

The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation website posted an update that visitation was canceled at 11:09 a.m., even though visits had begun at noon. We were given 51 minutes notice.

Outside the locked visiting room were two women who were also struggling with the cancellation that came from afar.

I reluctantly went home, thinking that the next day would be different. My Saturday appointment was for 7:30am, but when I got there it was the same as the day before: the visit was cancelled.

Visits are three days, so I had another chance to see him. Before I left on Saturday, I asked if they could move my appointment to Sunday so I wouldn’t have to go as a guest. They agreed, but it was a false hope because they canceled visits on Sundays as well.

I had to leave the Bay Area and fly home without seeing my dad the entire trip.

This year, MP Oh my god introduced AB 2434which would prohibit CDCR from granting same-day denials when a visitor has traveled more than 100 miles or has not visited within 30 days. If this bill had been law over the weekend when visits were canceled at the last minute, I might have been able to see it all three days.

In addition, it would also prohibit denials of visits or restrictions based on disciplinary matters unrelated to visits, and prioritize the retention of visits in the case of dress code violations. I’ve seen corrections officers turn people away because their clothes are too tight – at the same time they can turn us away if our clothes are too baggy.

The bill would also ensure that all searches of visitors are voluntary, non-contact and conducted by officers of the same gender when strip searches are required. The fact that the bill should codify same-sex officers for strip searches should say it all.

The families have been trying to get a bill that protects visitation passed since 2021, when the pandemic showed how fragile visitation standards can be and families were left unsure for months when they would finally be able to see their loved ones.

If I know anything about families affected by incarceration, it is that we are strong and resilient and will continue to fight for our loved ones until we get the protection we deserve.

This article was originally published on CalMatters and is republished under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives license.