Santa Cruz Statewide Action to End Solitary Confinement

Statewide and in Santa Cruz
STOP THE TORTURE!

Gather @ 5:30pm at Lighthouse Lawn
-- there will be interactive art activities & an altar in the making (please bring offerings you'd like to share)
-- Barrios Unidos will bring their mock solitary cell
-- children encouraged to participate

Rally @ 6:00pm followed by candlelight vigil

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The Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition (PHSS) has helped launch Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement (SCATESC) to start Monday, March 23, 2015.

Actions will happen on the 23rd of each month.
This date emphasizes the 23 or more hours every day that people are kept in solitary confinement.

In Santa Cruz, we have decided to hold this gathering on the coast because so many people locked up in solitary confinement talk about their desire to see and be near the ocean.

Statewide Coordinated Actions every month respond to the Pelican Bay Hunger Strikers’ Proposals (November, 2013). They stated:
“We want to consider the idea of designating a certain date each month as Prisoner Rights Day. On that date each month prisoners across the state would engage in peaceful activities to call attention to prison conditions. At the same time our supporters would gather in locations throughout California to expose CDCR’s [CA Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation] actions and rally support efforts to secure our rights. We can see this action growing from month to month as more people inside and out become aware of it and join our struggle.”

Co-sponsors: Anti-Racist Action-LA; California Families Against Solitary Confinement (CFASC); California Prison Focus; Critical Resistance Oakland; Food Not Bombs; Global Women’s Strike; Human Rights Pen Pals; LA Laborfest; Payday Men’s Network; Peoples' Action for Rights and Community (PARC); Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition (PHSS); Project: Pollinate; Santa Cruz Resistance Against Militarization (SCRAM!); Sin Barras; Women of Color/Global Women’s Strike.

Endorsers: Ramona Africa and The MOVE Organization; Dr. Nancy Arvold, PhD, MFT, member Psychologists for Social Responsibility; Black and Pink San Diego; Cabrillo College Justice League; Cafe Intifada; Californians United for a Responsible Budget (CURB); California Peace and Freedom Party; Communities Organized for Relational Power in Action (COPA) Restorative Justice Institutions; Darrell and Karen Darling; Family of Frank Alvarado Jr., killed by Salinas Police, July 10, 2014; Freedom Archives; Free Our Minds, Free Radio Santa Cruz; Rabbi Borukh Goldberg; Interfaith Communities United for Justice and Peace; Justice for Palestinians, San Jose; National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI)-Santa Cruz County; National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT); Dylcia Pagán, former Puerto Rican Political Prisoner held in US prison; Leonard Peltier Support Group Silicon Valley; Prison Activist Resource Center (PARC); Queer Strike; Redwood Curtain CopWatch; San Francisco Bay View National Black Newspaper; Santa Cruz County Community Coalition to Overcome Racism (SCCCCOR); South Bay Committee Against Political Repression (SBCAPR); United Against Police Terror San Diego; US PROStitutes Collective; Donna Wallach; Women's Council, California Chapter of the National Association of Social Workers.