A New Way of Life

Linking promise with opportunity

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Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday

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What Would King Think of Mass Incarceration?

Today, January 15, marks the birthday of legendary civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. He would have been 94 years old. This year also marks the 60th anniversary of King’s important “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” written while he was incarcerated in Birmingham, Alabama. As we honor the life and legacy of King, it is worth reflecting on King’s response and what he said about the mass incarceration of African Americans and marginalized communities.

King condemned the mass incarceration of his supporters and civil rights activists across the United States. In response to those who believed mass incarceration was justified because those jailed had broken the law, King wrote that we ought to understand the difference between a just law and an unjust law. An unjust law, King continued, “is a code that a majority inflicts on a minority that is not binding on itself.” When considering the inequitable application of the law and the racialization of the criminal justice system, we must agree with King that mass incarceration is built on, and continues to be built upon, the foundation of unjust laws.

As an organization committed to honoring and upholding King’s legacy by offering holistic reentry services to formerly incarcerated women, it is fitting that today, on King’s birthday, we are opening our 12th Safe Home. This home will accommodate 14 women and expand our services in South Los Angeles and the Greater Long Beach area. The residents of this home, like the residents of all our homes, will have access to all aspects of our services, many of which resonate with King’s commitment to nonviolent activism, such as our Women Organizing for Justice & Opportunity (WOJO) Leadership Lab: a six-month training program for formerly incarcerated women to sharpen their social justice leadership skills.

As we celebrate and honor Martin Luther King Jr.’s life and legacy today, tomorrow, and the rest of the year, we ask that you support organizations like our own, which is committed to upholding King’s commitment to nonviolent activism. You can do this through volunteering, financial donations, and more. As King stated, “the time is always right to do right.”

Villa La Tournelle

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On August 24, 2020, A New Way of Life Reentry Project, in partnership with DePaul Center, opened Villa La Tournelle, the 10th SAFE Home established by A New Way of Life. During this time, Los Angeles was experiencing challenging times due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Many incarcerated women were being released — some in the middle of the night with no place to go. There was an urgent need for additional housing for formerly incarcerated people, and A New Way of Life met that need.

The Villa is a former convent located on the campus of DePaul Evangelization Center in Montebello, CA. The Villa is named after the building “La Tournelle” that Vincent rented in the city of Marseilles, France, to house those condemned to service on the French Galleys. The Villa is the Western Province of the Congregation of the Mission’s contribution to the “13-House Campaign” initiated by the International Leadership of the Vincentian Family in 2018. The campaign aims to improve and transform the lives of people experiencing homelessness worldwide.

Since its establishment, 22 women and 38 minor children have called the Villa “Home.” The house features eight bedrooms, a living room/dining room area, a full kitchen, a laundry room, large outdoor spaces, and a garden area. Residents who stay at the Villa have access to the wrap-around services provided by A New Way of Life. Stable housing allows the residents to focus on their next steps and look forward to living a self-sufficient life.

The Villa residents have accomplished many goals since moving in. Tracey graduated with her Bachelor of Arts in African American Studies from UCLA and will continue with a master’s program in Fall 2022. Chantell completed a year-long All of Us or None Community Organizing Fellowship. A New Way of Life is proud to offer a space for these women to grow while on their journey to becoming successful community members.

As we celebrate the success of Villa La Tournelle, A New Way of Life hosted the SAFE Housing Network Training. The SAFE Housing Network is a national collective of formerly incarcerated people working to decarcerate the US by bringing people home to stay, helping them heal from the trauma of incarceration, and empowering them to lead in the fight to end mass incarceration.

The SAFE Housing Network knows that public safety can only exist when everyone in society is provided for and has equal access, opportunities, and rights. The three-day training brought together over 100 people to learn the SAFE Housing Network philosophy, program model, and to participate in panel discussions on community-based reentry programs. Through collaboration and shared learning, participants learn about innovative approaches to integrating trauma-informed practice into reentry programs and how to better serve the needs of this population. In addition to learning best practices, participants have the opportunity to connect with others doing similar work. The training left participants with a renewed sense of purpose and energy as they returned to their communities to continue implementing positive change.

 

The SAFE Housing Network has SAFE homes in Alabama, Arizona, California, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Texas, Washington, Kenya, and Uganda. The organization continues to grow and set the standard for reentry programs for formerly incarcerated people and their families.

As we continue to work toward creating a just society where everyone is treated with dignity and respect, we thank you for joining us in the movement to end mass incarceration.

Click here to learn more about the SAFE Housing Network organizations.

 

Herstory – Three Notable Figures

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During Women’s History Month, we want to highlight three individuals that have dedicated their lives to social justice: Angela Davis, Dolores Huerta, and Helen Zia. Each has demonstrated their dedication to pushing for racial equity and inclusion in America.

The first woman we would like to highlight is Angela Davis. She is Distinguished Professor Emerita in the History of Consciousness and Feminist Studies Departments at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

As an educator, author, and revolutionary activist, Davis is highly regarded for her civil rights and abolitionist work. In 1972 Davis gave a speech at the Embassy Auditorium in Los Angeles after being acquitted of conspiracy, kidnapping, and murder charges. Davis stated, “Revolution is a serious thing, the most serious thing about a revolutionary’s life. When one commits oneself to the struggle it must be for a lifetime.”

True to her word, Davis has spent most of her life advocating for social issues pertaining to gender, race, class, and abolishing the prison–industrial complex. The prison industrial complex is the idea that imprisonment and policing are a solution for social, political, and economic problems. She is one of the founders of Critical Resistance, an organization that aims to dismantle and challenge the prison-industrial complex. As a Marxist feminist– a variant of feminism that extends Marxism to analyze the ways in which women are exploited through capitalism– she published a book in 1981, ‘Women, Race, and Class’, which examines gender, race, and class in the United States. She continues to be an active revolutionary author with recent releases such as ‘Freedom is a Constant Struggle Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement’ which was published in 2015 and examines the concept of attaining freedom in contemporary world conflicts.

The second woman we would like to highlight is Dolores Huerta who is a prominent American labor and civil rights advocate and leader. Though she has had a distinguished career as a social activist and feminist leader, she began her labor activist career after seeing the farm children she taught in the 50s struggle in their studies due to hunger. She got involved with the Stockton chapter of the Community Service Organization (CSO), which led voter registration drives and fought for economic improvements for Hispanics.

In 1962, she founded the National Farm Workers Association– later changed to the United Farm Workers of America (UFW)– alongside César Chávez, a notable labor rights leader. Her time as a leader in the UFW included organizing the union’s grape boycott effort which forced grape producers to improve working conditions for migrant farmworkers.

Hailed as one of the most prominent leaders of the Chicano civil rights movement, she has worked to elect more Latinxs and women to political office and has championed women’s rights.

In 1972, Arizona’s Legislature pushed a bill that denied farm workers the right to strike and boycott during harvest seasons, effectively making it impossible for them to organize. She coined the movement’s famous slogan ‘¡Sí se puede!’ to rally Arizona’s farm workers in an effort to revive morale during unfavorable circumstances. The slogan was later adopted and translated to English as ‘Yes We Can’ by the 2008 Barack Obama presidential campaign. She is the founder and president of the Dolores Huerta Foundation which sets out to inspire communities to pursue social justice and she continues tirelessly advocating for the working poor, women, and children.

Our final figure is Helen Zia, an activist, award-winning author and former journalist. According to the Asian Pacific American Institute at New York University, “Zia has been outspoken on issues ranging from civil rights and peace to women’s rights and countering hate violence.” Throughout her career, she has advocated for LGBT and Asian American rights and has written multiple books on Asian American issues. In 1982, she came to prominence as an activist for Asian American rights after becoming the public spokesperson and getting involved in organizing a campaign that sought justice for the victim of a hate crime. Vincent Chin—a Chinese American man who was brutally murdered in a hate crime in Detroit, Michigan.

Recently, Zia spoke on the racism Asian American and Pacific Islanders have faced due to the fact that the Coronavirus disease was first identified in China. In a virtual discussion with students of the Taft School, a private Connecticut-based high school, she said, “The pattern of the way Asian Americans are treated in American society throughout history has been to blame, to scapegoat, to target, or to make Asian American and Pacific Islander people as though they are always the ‘other’—never belonging.”

All three of these powerful and courageous women have seen the injustices in their communities and have committed themselves to actively making a difference.

If you would like to learn more about these remarkable women, please visit:
Angela Davis
Dolores Huerta
Helen Zia

Voter Guide: Prop 17 and Prop 25

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In California, many of us this week have received our ballots in the mail, all but ready to be marked with the voice of change. On this year’s ballot sit a total of 12 important propositions where Californians have the ability to mark either “Yes” or “No” on measures that will affect us all on a day-to-day basis. Feeling overwhelmed with all the choices? Not sure which proposition to support or oppose? No problem! Below you will find more information on Prop 17 and Prop 25, both on the ballot this year, and both causes that we here at A New Way of Life believe are in line with our fight for criminal justice reform. 

Yes on Prop 17: Free the Vote 
Restores the right to vote to individuals on parole and opens up opportunities to run for office

Proposition 17 will:

  • Allow 50,000 Californians who have completed their prison term to fully participate in our democracy by restoring their right to vote. 
  • Help Californians who are returning home from prison reintegrate into society and have a stake in their communities. 
  • Help combat voter suppression among Black and brown communities, who are over-policed and subject to systemic inequalities within our criminal legal system 
  • Make our communities safer as voting and civic engagement reduce the likelihood that people will be rearrested.
  • Ensure California election laws are fair, inclusive, and in line with other progressive states.
  • In Favor: ACLU California, League of Women Voters, California Democratic Party, Governor Gavin Newsom, Lt. Governor Eleni Kounalakis, US Rep Ro Khanna, Los Angeles Times, Black Lives Matter – California

 

For more information visit: freethevote2020.org

 

Yes on Prop 25: End Money Bail
Yes would uphold the contested legislation, Senate Bill 10 (SB 10), which would replace cash bail with risk assessments for detained suspects awaiting trials.

Proposition 25 will: 

  • The bail reform law balances safety, fairness, and the rights of defendants and victims, and no one who is a safety risk can use bail to buy their way out of jail just because they are wealthy.
  • The bail reform law creates a fairer system that doesn’t base freedom on the ability to pay but on the public safety risk of the defendant.
  • There are roughly 46,000 people awaiting trial in local jails, costing the State of California $5 million a day. Many of the defendants are not a safety risk to the public.
  • The $2 billion for-profit bail bond industry is designed to strip wealth from people and their families.
  • In Favor: Governor Gavin Newsom, Congresswoman Karen Bass, State Senator Holly J. Mitchell, Anti-Recidivism Coalition, California Democratic Party, SEIU California, League of Women Voters of California

 

For more information visit: https://yesoncaprop25.com/

 

Susan Burton’s Prison Book Tour: Federal Correctional Institution, Aliceville, AL

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I visited the Federal Correctional Institution in Aliceville, Alabama in July. Miss Alice Johnson had recently been released from there after Donald Trump commuted her sentence, and the women there seemed really really hopeful. But for me, I’m just now able to talk about the trip because it was an extremely hard trip for me. Walking into the prison and seeing the women stripped of their identities, stripped of their individuality, stripped of their humanity hit me much harder than it usually does. Even though the women were trying to have hopel, I recognized those symptoms of dehumanization as I peered from my podium at them. It wasn’t that it was different from any other prison, but some days you have so much more clarity, and that day, it was really apparent to me.

On the way to the prison, I’d driven through woods that seemed like the woods that people were lynched in. It felt eerie and heavy. There was a long, obscure drive to get to Aliceville, and I thought about how hard it must be for family and friends to go and visit the women. All of these things rambled through my brain as I drove.

I left Aliceville feeling really burdened with what I saw, with my soul speaking to me. The next day, after visiting that prison, I went to visit Bryan Stevenson’s Legacy Museum and the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, which remembers the victims of lynching. I could see the parallels between 21st century killings of Black people and what had happened historically in this country. I was just solemn.

Then the next day, I went to Tutwiler Prison for Women in Wetumpka, Alabama to visit Geneva Cooley, a woman I met during a visit there about a year ago. She was handed a 999-year sentence for drug possession. The reality is that she’ll die in prison for drugs if something isn’t done to get her released.

My visit was scheduled for 11:00 am, and I got there at 10:15. I was told I couldn’t see Geneva because I had on a sleeveless dress, so I went out to my car and put on my pajama top. Even though I got there 45 minutes early, I didn’t get in to see Geneva until almost a quarter to noon. I grew more and more concerned as I waited, but I was too scared to ask what was taking so long because I knew they had the power not to let me in. So I just sat it out. The entire process spoke to the powerlessness people have when they’re in prison and that even their visitors have.

When I was finally admitted to see her, Geneva and I went into a room where the paint was peeling and faded, and the desk was all wobbly and broke. Before I arrived, Geneva had asked me to bring a big bag of quarters so she could go to the vending machine. She talked about not having had a visit in seven years and how excited she was to get to some free-world food, even if it was from a vending machine. But the vending machine had not been stocked. I just felt so bad for her. It was so hard.

So today is the first day I was actually able to talk about that visit. The visits get harder because I see the inhumane way that women are held and treated. And I know that we have not moved far from Jim Crow. I know that we have not made the progress that this world thinks we have made. We just don’t want to think or talk about what’s happening to people. And nothing will change until we do.

Finding Hope in Earth and Sun

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On Sequarier McCoy’s vision board, where she pins her dreams as well as visual depictions of who she is and wants to become, there’s a picture of open hands holding soil.

“That goes back to my ancestry,” Sequarier explains proudly. Her great-great-great grandmother was an immigrant who saved up enough money to run away from discrimination she and her mixed-race children faced in Europe and buy some land in Oklahoma. The land is still in the family to this day.  Sequarier’s great-great grandmother picked cotton on that land, and so did her great-grandmother. Her grandmother moved west to California and bought some land of her own, where she raised fruit but also cotton, of course, which Sequarier helped her grandfather pick when she was a child.

“I am a nurturer,” Sequarier says. “I like to cultivate and bring things to life.”

It’s hardly surprising, then, that Sequarier’s connection to the land led to her work harvesting the sun. She recently completed a four-month solar installation internship with GRID Alternatives, a non-profit that provides both solar power and solar jobs to low-income communities.

The road to her work in solar energy wasn’t linear, though, even in spite of her strong sense of self. A difficult childhood, domestic violence and drugs led to several stops in prison along the way.

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Sequarier was raised by a mother who was a devout Jehovah’s Witness and a father who struggled with alcoholism. This juxtaposition often produced mixed messages, and Sequarier learned that everything was okay as long as the family wasn’t behind on its bills. Talking about emotions or things that happened at home was frowned upon. She stuffed her feelings down deep inside and started drinking as a teenager to numb her pain. Drinking progressed to marijuana, which then led to ecstasy, codeine syrup and cocaine. But it wasn’t until she tried meth that she became addicted. From there, her life spiraled, leading to several short stints in prison. She spent a year at a mother-infant program trying to get sober. “I was trying to pull myself together so bad,” Sequarier says. “I had a little will-power but not enough.”

Watching her father struggle with alcohol and eventually gain his sobriety and change his lifestyle —including not talking to certain people or going to certain places and regularly attending AA meetings — gave Sequarier a model for how to get clean. She had the tools for sobriety at her disposal, but she didn’t yet know how to use them. Two weeks after leaving rehabilitation, she was back behind bars: she caught an 11-year arson sentence in 2008, of which she served nine years.

During the first two years of her sentence, Sequarier was depressed, and the anti-depressants she was given made her feel like a zombie. Finally, having had enough, she told the mental health specialist at the prison that she wanted to go off the medication. Life began to turn around. She began to lose weight she’d gained from the medicine. She asked for a transfer from Central California Women’s Facility (CCWF) to California Institution for Women (CIW), which has more green space. She was reminded of her connection to nature.

As she tells it, “I started being stimulated by the trees and flowers and the environment. And I decided I wanted more for my life.”

Sequarier started taking classes through Chaffey College. She joined Toastmasters and a host of other clubs at the prison. “Things kept getting better and better.”

What happened next turned out to be a blessing in disguise: Sequarier failed her algebra class. As she tried to determine what to do next, she spotted a sign advertising yearlong training and a guaranteed job as a drug and alcohol counselor. The job paid $0.90 an hour, a fortune in prison wage terms.

The entire prison buzzed with excitement about the job — until the women found out that the training would take place at Valley State Prison, a now-defunct facility with a terrible reputation as a violent lockdown facility. If Sequarier got into the counseling program, she would have to spend a year there.

Interest in the program dwindled, but Sequarier was determined. Out of five applicants, she was the only woman from CIW to make it through. “I wanted to do it for me,” she says. “I thought, ‘I can better myself, and I can help somebody else. I can have a career in this after prison.’”

Despite some second thoughts, she transferred to VSP. The only passenger on the four-and-a-half-hour bus ride, she was given the nickname “Lone Ranger.”

At VSP, Sequarier joined a substance abuse program — “We actually had to be in SAP ourselves; you had to be a student in order to teach. I had to learn about myself in order to help others,” she says — and she learned about concepts like group dynamics, body language and personal development. The program was tough, with a strict code of conduct. Only two-thirds of participants made it through the year, but Sequarier prevailed. “I was reborn,” she says.

Sequarier returned to CIW after the year was up and worked as a counselor until she was released in the fall of 2017 and came to A New Way of Life Re-Entry Project. This spring, she was first introduced to GRID Alternatives. GRID installed solar panels on the roof of one of ANWOL’s homes and allowed any interested residents to help out on the job. Sequarier quickly offered to get involved.

“It felt good being able to help A New Way of Life, since they help me,” Sequarier says. “I felt accepted: the people of GRID Alternatives opened their arms to me in full camaraderie. There’s no judgment; they don’t care that I’ve been to prison. The ANWOL installation was all women, and it was very positive, lots of girl power. I wanted to have more of those kinds of interactions.”

So following the build, she began a four-month paid internship to learn to become a solar panel installer.

“I’m having a ball up there,” she says. “I enjoy that I’m the only woman on the roof. I love it. I’ve been told, ‘You kick butt, McCoy.’”

Since her internship ended, Sequarier is looking for employment, with guidance from A New Way of Life’s employment and social enterprise associate, and is leaving her options open. She wants to learn about the potential that lies within solar thermal energy (solar power that can heat and cool houses), and she’s thinking of taking solar classes to broaden her knowledge. However, she still strongly connects with her work in substance abuse counseling/mentoring.

Sequarier has also turned advocate for other incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people, working in and alongside members of her community to effect change.  She is fully engrossed in Women Organizing for Justice and Opportunity, a leadership development training program run by A New Way of Life, and she is a member of All of Us or None, a community-based organization that brings together formerly incarcerated people to bring about change in the community.

“My Achilles’ heel has been limiting myself and foreseeing my own future. I’m not going to do that anymore,” she says. “I’m hoping that life will lead me somewhere better than I’ve been before.”

It’s clear that, with the determination passed down to her by her foremothers, Sequarier will go far, whatever she chooses to do.