Prison Gardening Program Helping Transform Vacaville Inmates' Lives
VACAVILLE (KCBS) -- A dry patch of soil inside a Vacaville prison is being transformed into a drought-tolerant garden in a program intended to transform inmates' lives through connection to nature.
Down the main line, past the concrete walls at the California Medical Facility in Vacaville, a select group of men plant seedlings outside.
Across the prison yard, Cornell Bevans points out how the men are segregated based on color in the garden you have to trust and work together.
"We've got tools. That's not something you normally feel comfortable with around another inmate. Usually we use tools to do something negative, but this is doing something positive," Bevans said.
It's the first time Bevans says he's touched dirt in 36 years.
"Being that I'm a 'lifer,' committed murder, this made me respect life more - it really did because the plants grow, and help feed people. This is going to go to the shelter in Solano County. It gives me a sense of giving back," Bevans said.
This is the third prison after San Quentin and Solano to install a garden through the Insight Garden Program. Executive Director Beth Waitkus explains inmates learn environmental education and permaculture gardening skills.
"A lot of people in prison have past trauma, and when you reconnect to the earth you really do reconnect to yourself. And when you start to tend to something else you also tend to yourself," Waitkus said.
As the garden grows, it will be a learning lab.
Tracey Collier point said his favorite plant is a wild lilac.
"So when I plant this stuff, to me its like getting a new life again, and getting a new start," Collier said.
The place of compost and greenery, surrounded by asphalt and barbed wire has become an oasis.
"When we're out here, we're in a whole 'nother world right now. When we leave here, we are going back to keys and bars. So, this is like a break - like a peaceful place for us. It's a peaceful moment. It's very therapeutic. It really is," Collier said.
Some prisoners will get a new start outside, while others will stay for life.
For those who do get out, the insight garden program boats a 10-percent recidivism rate, compared to the general population where six in 10 return to prison.
