Opinion: I Fought for Air-Conditioning in Solitary Confinement. Now I Have to Do It Again.

I survived eight Texas summers without air conditioning in a parking-space-sized cell that we called a pizza oven. The heat instantly would awaken me when my arm accidentally touched the burning wall. My neighbors’ desperation resulted in self-mutilation and suicide attempts to get to the air-conditioned psych center. Daily, I witnessed guards quit, faint from the heat, change employment status from full- to part-time. Days without electrical power. Days without being able to flush the toilet. Days without ice-cold drinking water. I stopped buying sodas because the heat caused them to spontaneously explode. My toothpaste liquefied. The temperature in my cell was recorded at 129° as I experienced untreated menopausal hot flashes and had a heat stroke.

After back-to-back heat-related deaths in this prison, I wrote stories imploring the state to stop cooking us. The ambulance lived in this parking lot. Finally, the state decided to exercise humanity.

Last summer, we received a “cooling system” which worked intermittently to cool the solitary unit at my prison, Lane Murray, until it was discontinued in the fall. On April 16 of this year, cool air began blowing from our vents. A month later, I was approved to return to general prison population. Relieved, I entered a building expecting better conditions. I was wrong.

The heat inside the general population unit hit me like a baseball bat. Upon my arrival, the electrical power went out for over 24 hours. No power to blow hot air from my fans. Hot air is better than no air. But, the similarities to solitary didn’t stop there.

Unlike solitary confinement, where I was often locked inside my cell all day, every day, in here administration gets around the prohibited 24-hour lockdown by issuing 23 hours and 59 minutes lockdown after someone misbehaves.

Due to severe staffing shortages we end up stuck inside our cells: no showers; no outdoor or indoor recreation; laundry and meals are delivered. The heat has triggered a person’s seizure. Tempers flared as heat rose and a fight ensued. A guard, whose weight was double the fighters combined, deployed tear gas. It’s impossible to tear gas one person so we all struggled to breathe without a fan in this cauldron. The chemical irritant triggered another person’s asthma attack. All of this happened during my first week out of solitary.

Off lockdown, the general prison population is forced to work unpaid and many are assigned to work back-breaking physical labor in the scorching fields. Refusal to work is a rule violation resulting in a disciplinary infraction that can lead to solitary confinement or parole denial.

Per policy, if we feel overheated we’re supposed to request heat exposure/stroke prevention called Respite. This involves drinking cold water, taking a cold shower, and sitting in a designated air-conditioned space. The policy is moot when there isn’t any staff to enforce it.

On a recent Sunday, I looked forward to sitting in the air-conditioned chapel for a lengthy Evangelical service. To my surprise, I was denied entry because my record of religion isn’t Christianity. (I earned my religious designation after being asked by prison officials right after I was sentenced to a half-century in prison.) Back to my stultifying cell.

I now have a roommate who has never experienced a Texas summer in prison. I have been teaching her survival tactics: wetting her body and head, sleeping on a wet floor, keeping a bowl of water ready to douse yourself. I shouldn’t have to teach survival tactics when we all know the most effective solution is to provide air conditioning to every incarcerated person in Texas before more heat-related deaths return.

Each year, we break the current record for hottest year. My efforts to prepare are no match for the rising heat.

Texans: Please reach out to your legislators and demand they stop torturing people in your name. Remind them we were sentenced to live in prison, not die here from the heat.

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Kwaneta Harris is a former nurse, business owner, and expat, now incarcerated journalist and a Haymarket Writing Freedom Fellow. She brings experiences from each profession to illuminate how the experience of being incarcerated in the largest state prison in Texas is vastly different for women in ways that directly map onto a culture rooted in misogyny. She is supported by the program Empowerment Avenue, which submitted this on Kwaneta’s behalf.