A link to my book - From the Womb to the Tomb

A link to my book

Remember 9 /11 - Forever

Why Kingman Failed

Why Kingman Failed

The governor still has not solved the problems of the Kingman riots and contractual oversight. In all reality, he still doesn’t know how his own agency failed him and the public before, during and after the riots in July. Here is a breakdown of a post-incident review of the Kingman riot reports according to my evaluations of the document prepared by the Arizona Department of Corrections. Since there was no blame involved, there must be recommendations or solutions attached to complete the report.

Every agency has a set of policies and procedures as standards to work from as guidelines. Every facility has a person or persons employed to ensure the facility complies with these standards. Assuming these standards are created effectively and based  and developed on ‘best practices’ and not lessons learned orientations, there are two actions required to enforce these quality standards; intent and interpretations. Misinterpretation of the intent of any standard can lead to inappropriate application. I believe this is the foundation of the failures at the Kingman prison complex.

In the case of the Kingman after-action, it was revealed 5 monitors were charged with the responsibility to know the intent of the standards and the interpretations of such policies as written guidelines to do their jobs. One common act in failing to interpret the standard is to apply the wrong one or an outdated or older standard.

Driving your ideology off an old standard create confusing directions such as whether the entire set is applied completely, partially or even omitted in some cases. If this is not the case, then the monitors suffer from inconsistent reading of the intent of the standard and the interpretations vary too wide to apply the intent correctly. Standards are descriptive and prescriptive in nature. One can see the room for error here if the wrong interpretation is applied in the wrong particular context.

The most common problem associated with the misinterpretation of standards is training and consultation. There are rare tools made available to attain improvements that are consistently applied across the board in the case of sharing this tool statewide and asking questions of intent and interpretation as a group rather than individually. The goal is consistency and all monitors doing it the same manner and level of competence.

There are no audits on a development plan for monitors, designed and dedicated effort to ensure this problem of intent and interpretation is in place, giving the agency a powerful tool designed to focus on problem issues and developing meaningful solutions before a crisis is created or occurs.

The agency should – set up training for all monitors simultaneously and in the same classroom with the same instructor / administrator and seek better methods to develop better and ultimately one interpretation of these standards. Interpretations should not vary from monitor to monitor as well as facility to facility. Here are some tips for better standards interpretation.

Read the intent of the standard (first sentence of Discussion) within the context of the standard itself

Determine what the standard is attempting to achieve

Consider how it could be achieved in your facility

Discuss facility examples and seek solutions

Review the examples provided for common agency solution

Create an oversight committee to ensure all standards are up to date and relevant to the current needs of the agency and contractual obligations.

The Arizona Hydra monster

Arizona’s own Hydra in private prisons

 

Most of us know of the Greek mythology monster, L. Hydra, who had many heads and when one head was cut off, another would grow back in its place. This is much like the recent cancelation of the MTC Kingman prison contract that has attracted 5 private prison contractors to come to Arizona. The Hydra, is said to have eight mortal heads and one immortal head thus it is a perfect analogy and metaphor to describe the governor’s plan to put out the bid for the rest of the Kingman contract to other profiteers chomping at the bit to enter Arizona’s prison bidding war.

A wise, retired warden once said, “The contract bidding and wording will be interesting. Whoever gets the contract will stand to gain big $$$$. The State has backed themselves into a corner by their failure to monitor this place, now politically they have to succeed at taxpayers’ expense, $$$$. The mismanagement will be something that will resurface in time, lack of work force and resources to provide proper staff/inmate ratio will be on going. [This Hydra concept of] answering to two [or more] masters leads to failure and mistrust by staff.”

There may be physical differences in this Hydra symbolism but the subtleties and actions are the same. Without much doubt in my mind, the Hydra, also the metaphor for the Arizona Department of Corrections, will be slain by those who know its vulnerability the best and that is the prison population who recognize this monster for what it is – a failed prison management style that will eventually cost the state millions of dollars in default and unexpected expenses.

This mortal head cannot be harmed by any mere weapon but in the case of the Hydra, the harm of near fatal wounds will be self-inflicted due to poor planning and contract oversight. One has to remember that there are siblings to the main Hydra and those can do just as much harm as the monster herself who spawned these evil siblings around her. The Hydra was raised to kill Hercules and history tells the story how Hercules survived this battle and how the Greek mythology tell of this great slayer of the monster.

Just like in reality, the Hydra guards the entrance to the prison world, the underground, the filthiest and most vile place in the state. Not necessarily referring to its inhabitants but rather the culture, the environment and the volatile ambience of these places. The prisons are filled with terror and the main terrorists are the elite group of administrative fools, wielding their power and authority freely and arbitrarily, against the prisoners. That’s how the culture sees it to be in an “us versus them” battle of principles. Perception inside a prison is a reality. You cannot change the truth.

No matter what you do, the Hydra would survive and fight another day. It is invincible and the only weakness known is the multiple mortal heads that are subject to being cut off or fail during battle or struggles. No one was ever able to reach the immortal head except Hercules and even he could not cut it off but rather, buried it under a boulder.

That is the weakness of the Hydra – too many heads to protect and the inability to do so as the prison system is divided by too many heads and too much conflict in culture, politics, mission statements and objectives that by itself creates conflict from within. It too will soon be buried under a political boulder of cynical and undue expenses.

Dealing with Stress through Meditation -

Dealing with Stress Link

The tree - a metaphor of life

The tree – a metaphor

The idea of using a tree as a metaphor for our human race can be done with some special adaptations and considerations for our social systems and cultures as they are set today. Even the traditional uses and custom of our tree species allows us to compare them on a very large scale rather than just selecting one or two species. They are all, basic in design and functionality. They are all, resemblances of our life.

A tree’s roots run deep as do our social systems globally and genetically. We all belong to the same species and we are all related like a family of trees but for reasons best explained as a natural process, we all look different but function basically the same. With the exception of being a gender free species, the tree resembles our heritage in many similar ways.

As a social system, we are a deep rooted society with rules and morals. Like the tree, there are traditional patterns of behaviors common to the human race that includes families and how those families live and adapt with their individual surroundings. Like a human, the tree ages and weathers away with the erosion of life. However, before it vanishes off the face of the earth, it transforms life much like our own body does and should be considered an example of the metaphor of man.

There are three primary parts of a tree: the roots, giving the tree the means to anchor itself  firmly to the ground using water and nutrients to grow; the trunk, branches and leaves that comprise its body; and the fruit, which is harvested and enjoyed by us or animals and also contains the seeds through which the tree reproduces itself.

Like the tree, the human race also has these same components: roots, a body and fruit. In comparing the human aspect of these components, it represents our psychological, chronological and spiritual being. Perhaps the tree is more simplistic to identify than humans, making them the primary inhabitants of our world, yet we still share components with Mother Nature, our creator and our existence.

The roots of the tree usually run deep but that is not always the case. Buried underground and invisible to the human eye, they represent the subconscious layers of the human mind: our brain and nervous systems. One has to imagine the brain functions as an invisible matter because to us, it is the most important part that allows us to function and behave the way we do.

Here we develop the abilities to determine or develop our individual growth, composition, breadth and depths of our human traits. Our roots, like the roots of a tree, are the foundations for our manifestations. This is a critical part of our existence and should never be taken for granted. The roots manifestations is commonly compared to our body, our limbs or branches, leaves, trunk or other bodily designed or physical composition of our tree – it symbolizes who we are, what we look like and how we do things consciously and adaptively.

One can see the importance of this component as it is exposed and vulnerable to the weather and other elements around us. How the tree lives and survives is based on the individual fruit of the tree. If the tree survives time and space, the fruit allows it to harvest and consumed by others thus it represents the impact we have on the lives of others around us as well as the ability to plant a seed for birth, growth and bearing more fruit.

How well the fruit develops is based on the nutrients and minerals provided by the earth. The tree can survive many things but is subject to wear and tear by Mother Nature and the growth of other trees as some rely on the sun, the air, water and space to grow maturely and fully with the designed purpose.

On a chronological perspective, the roots do age and the manifestations of those roots are impacted by time. The growth of the tree is manufactured by its ability to survive to an old age. During such time changes, it grows from infancy to an elder evidenced state of condition that has endured critical endeavors and risks. A one point, the tree becomes self-sufficient as a full grown adult tree and looks fully nurtured and solid in shape and its self-standing condition.

The tree’s trunk, branches and limbs endure nature and perseverance on a physical level while man endures it on a physical and spiritual stage. Although, in reality, a tree has to be healthy in spirit and growth in order to produce fruit and seeds thus we might be more alike than we originally thought we were. Since seeds are influences of the ability to spread out and to bear the birth of others, it could be spiritual and represent the power of planting our seeds in their souls.

Our belief in the essential spirituality and meaning of life is the foundation of our entire "tree." From its roots stems the trunk of our understanding, from which branch out our feelings, motivations and deeds.

Looking at the weathered tree trunk that once stood strong and tall amongst the other trees, we have to realize how we are integrated into our environment and how our environment determines our life. One can only hope the tree of life is like the human race and endure the elements of love, hate, racism and biases with the fruits of labor that seeds men to become better and stronger than they were before this erosion began.