NYCTJ: Action Plans for April Prison Phone Changes

[Courtesy of Lauren Melodia, Center for Constitutional Rights] Hello, April 1, 2007 is fast approaching, and we need to keep the public pressure strong and also better educate families and their loved ones inside about what changes to expect and how to get involved in the NYCTJ. I’m writing today to let you know what plans we made on the monthly NYCTJ Family Member Conference call last night. Please let me know if you are interested in participating in our planned outreach and actions in NYC the weekend of April 1, 2007 or if you’d like to plan your own event/outreach in your area. We will send you materials, if you make a commitment to SPREAD THE WORD. On the call last night, many mentioned that they and their loved ones on the inside are incredibly confused by what Spitzer’s decision ACTUALLY MEANS and that there are a lot of rumors spreading. We made some plans to do create better educational tools and do some coordinated outreach the weekend of April 1 and to do some public actions that may encourage media attention. Here’s the idea: We will be creating a postcard in English and Spanish that explains the facts of what will change on April 1 (what the new rates will be, etc.), what demands we still have for the contract to work better for families, and how people can join the NYCTJ and take action. In NYC, we will do bus outreach at as many of the streets where families take buses to upstate facilities as possible on the evenings of FRIDAY, March 30th and SATURDAY, March 31st. We need your help with this! The more folks we have, the more stops we can cover! Right now the plan is Columbus Circle, but we’d like to expand to include 34th Street area, downtown Brooklyn and Bronx and Queens as possible. During these outreach efforts, we will distribute the postcards and answer questions. We will also have a large poster board which will list our remaining demands and ask people to sign this, write in additional demands or tell their story. We will deliver this poster to Spitzer’s office in NYC on Monday, April 2nd in an effort to nicely remind him that we need him to keep working on this issue. Individuals on the call last night expressed interest in doing outreach in Ithaca and Albany that weekend (or that Monday). If you live in either of those regions and would like to participate, please let me know and I will put you in touch with those folks. Similarly, we are looking to MASS PRODUCE this postcard to distribute state-wide. If you are part of a group or would like to make plans to do outreach in your community during that weekend or at your next group meeting, etc., please let me know and I will send you a package of postcards. Please let me know how many you’d like me to send. If you would like to do a similar action with a GIANT list of demands to send/deliver to Spitzer, let me know and we’ll coordinate, as well. It would be great to send/deliver several large lists of demands to Gov. Spitzer! Also, think about incorporating the letter writing campaign I sent out yesterday into your outreach efforts. April 2, 2007 will be a national call-in day (target yet to be decided) that you can participate in from anywhere. We will be submitting articles to several newsletters that folks on the inside have access to, to clarify what the changes mean for them and their families. Here’s what we need from YOU: Some of you have already sent me questions about the April changes (i.e. what will the new rate be? Will the surcharge price go down? Why 50% reduction and not 57.5%), which we are working to get answers for. If you have additional questions or are confused in any other ways, let me know. I’m not sure we can get all the answers right now, but we’ll see what we can get. If you have heard certain rumors, please alert me to those, as well, so we can dispel them in the postcard. Let me know if you’re interested in doing outreach with the postcards in your area/community. We will send you postcards and a GIANT list of demands if you will use them. We hope to have postcards printed and ready to send out on Monday morning. Consider incorporating the letter writing campaign to Nozzolio into your street outreach, tabling or presentation. If you live in the NYC area and would like to distribute postcards to your group/community, come to the next NYCTJ meeting NEXT TUESDAY at 6pm (666 Broadway, 6th Floor). We will have postcards and the letter writing campaign in bulk at the meeting and you can pick them up at the meeting! RSVP with me, so we are sure to have enough food for everyone! We will send out final plans for April 1, 2007 in the coming weeks, so keep watch for them! In Struggle, Lauren Melodia