Thread by @JimmyJenkins

Scoop: Emails show @hickmanseggs President lobbied @AZCorrections for a "permanent work camp" to house inmate laborers on-site at one of the largest industrial egg farms in the Southwest kjzz.org/content/161096…

Hickman’s is one of many companies that contract with the Department of Corrections for the use of prison labor. At the beginning of the pandemic, ADC suspended most inmate work programs but provided an exception for Hickman’s aci.az.gov

In a statement issued in March, the department announced “a plan to temporarily house approximately 140 female inmates onsite at Hickman’s.”

The department said the move would ensure “a stable supply of Hickman’s eggs for Arizona’s communities.”
corrections.az.gov/covid-19-manag…

The department said the on-site housing would be temporary. “Once the declared COVID-19 emergency has passed, these inmates will return to their housing location at Perryville."

But emails we received through a public records request show Hickman’s President Glenn Hickman was already planning to make the inmate housing permanent by May

“I think we need to establish a cadence in order to make a permanent work camp a reality,” Glenn Hickman wrote in an email to Department of Corrections administrators on May 6.

“I’m not the expert, but am guessing that legislation and regulations might be needed in order to have any chance of being able to break ground on a permanent facility around this time next year,” Hickman said.

Hickman sent the email to Dept. of Corrections Director David Shinn along with 2 deputy directors and an assistant director. Hickman Family Farms Vice Presidents Billy & Clint Hickman were copied on the email. Clint Hickman also serves on the Maricopa County Board of Supervisors.

Hickman continued his push for the project in the email: “I realize that Covid is the current crisis, but the reality is in both of our businesses, the unexpected becomes the expected on an almost daily basis.”

Hickman ended the email by asking the group to respond with their thoughts on the proposal. When asked about the email, spokesperson Bill Lamoreaux said the Department of Corrections “currently has no plans to permanently house inmates onsite at Hickman’s.”

As of July 16, ADC said 128 women were living and working at Hickman’s. At that time, nine women had tested positive for COVID-19 at the farm.

According to the Department of Corrections, @hickmanseggs has used inmate labor in its operations for 25 years.

Tianna Bowser worked on a cleaning crew at Hickman’s before she was recently released from prison: “We would go in and sanitize all the processing equipment with hazardous chemicals that you had to know how to handle,” Bowser said of her work at the egg farm.

Bowser said women who worked at Hickman’s weren't given a choice to quit when the pandemic led to the move on-site:

“They told us, 'if you work at Hickman’s, you’re packing up and you’re going out there. They said if we quit, we would get a major ticket & get moved off the yard”

Bowser had to forgo GED classes she was taking at Perryville:

“I told them I thought education trumped everything else. Like, if you’re in education programming, that comes first before anything else,” she said. “But ADC told me the job at Hickman’s was more important.”

Bowser said it took the women a long time to adjust after being abruptly uprooted and moved in the middle of the night:

“We were stacked on top of each other. It was hot. It was horrible." She describes the facility where they lived as “like a big garage full of bunk beds.”

She said the women used portable showers and shared 20 portable toilets:

“There were only three washers and three driers for 140 of us who work all the time,” Bowser said. “So it was very chaotic and hectic trying to figure out your laundry cycles.”

Bowser said despite department guidelines, she was working 50 to 60 hours every week at the Hickman’s farm. She says it is not uncommon for incarcerated women to work more than 40 hours a week at @hickmanseggs

“All the jobs at Hickman’s are physically demanding,” she said. “It was dangerous. I’ve seen machines break. I’ve seen people get hurt — fall off of things.” Bowser said she witnessed women working in high-rise barns with no safety harnesses as they tended to chickens.

Bowser and the other women at the farm felt isolated from the rest of the women at Perryville and suffered from the conditions and lack of programming.

ADC says it remains a “proud partner” with Hickman’s Family Farm.

The Department defended the partnership saying "Food products, such as eggs, have been determined nationally to be a part of our nation’s critical infrastructure.”

Here is Glenn Hickman's email signature:

"Farming without the intention of a profit is just gardening."