I am ap - but not necessarily legend.

But also not fairy tale.

Sing along with me...

San Quentin here I come,
Right back where I started from,
Where I belonged all the time,
Because of my life of crime,
Couldn't stay straight,
Had to to re-violate,
Open up those padlocked gates,
San Quentin here I come.

Now there's a catchy tune, I think Greg D. should sing it for us live with the band in September !

RTC we've had lots of disagreements on this board and there certainly is no TDCAA party line(read any of the perverted justice threads!)The issue that I have with you is that you are obviously not being honest about your identity or past (need I remind you of your two, no three, no two tours in Iraq). Doran W. posts on here and while some of us disagree with his views at least we know where he is coming from.

Prison report cites valley fever risks
Construction may release spores that cause disease, increasing inmates' cases.

By Andy Furillo - Bee Capitol Bureau

Public health officials are recommending that California hold off on new prison construction in the southern San Joaquin Valley because it will expose an untold number of inmates to potentially fatal valley fever.

"If you put more beds down here, you can pretty much bet that some people will be very sick and perhaps die as a result of that decision," Kings County Public Health Officer Michael MacLean said in an interview.

Valley fever is a disease that results from molds that grow in the region's soil. When stirred up by construction or other means, such as wind or earthquakes, its airborne spores can lodge in the lungs and create symptoms ranging from a mild viral illness to respiratory failure. It can also cause skin lesions and bone problems.

Last year, more than 500 valley fever cases were reported at the 5,000-inmate Pleasant Valley State Prison in Fresno County. Four inmates at the prison died of valley fever in 2005.

As a result, health professionals and researchers submitted a report urging the state not to add prison beds "in the hyperendemic area," where valley fever spores are prevalent. They also suggested that the state evaluate exposure to the disease and "consider relocating all inmates" from Pleasant Valley if it can't fix the problem.

"People in that prison population are at high risk of coming down with valley fever," Edward Moreno, director of the Fresno County Health Department, said in another interview. "It's showing no sign of decreasing."

The recommendations were generated by a working group that includes physicians from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, public health officers from seven counties and two University of California academic experts. The report was submitted in June to federal receiver Robert Sillen, who oversees medical care in California prisons, and is posted on his Web site.

Corrections officials said they are preparing a response to the report that will include mitigation measures "in terms of construction and in terms of health care," said Robin Dezember, the prison agency's chief of health care services.

A shutdown of prison construction in the southern San Joaquin Valley would have a significant impact on the state's effort to resolve its inmate overcrowding crisis and head off a looming threat of an early prisoner release order by the federal courts.

Under California's recently enacted $7.9 billion prison expansion plan, lawmakers authorized the construction of 5,480 "infill" beds at five southern San Joaquin Valley prisons where the spores causing the disease are embedded in the region's soil. The new beds at the five prisons represent more than a third of the entire infill program -- a cornerstone of the state's effort to resolve its overcrowding crisis.

State prison officials have insisted that the infill program is designed to replace about 16,000 emergency beds now in use throughout the system. Dezember said the addition of the new infill beds "doesn't mean we're going to add population" to the San Joaquin Valley prisons against the recommendations of his own agency's doctors and the public health officers.

The receiver's office said in documents filed with the federal courts that the infill program is predominantly geared toward lower-risk inmates. But the lion's share of inmates now sleeping in the emergency beds are classified as more dangerous.

Dezember said the prison agency already is screening potentially susceptible inmates to keep them out of the valley fever hot spots, as recommended in the June report. Dezember also wondered why local public health officials aren't stopping all new housing construction if valley fever is such a problem.

"Why aren't they evacuating their communities?" Dezember asked. "I wonder if they're publicizing this in areas like Bakersfield, one of the largest growth areas of the state. Are they publicizing that to people building homes there or to people coming in from L.A. to buy them?"

Claudia Jonah, the interim public health director in Kern County, said that valley fever "is a consideration for anybody that comes to this area."

"If you're planning to move to this area, you need to be aware of it," she said. "But the people in prison are in the very high risk groups for getting very severe illness, for getting valley fever."

Inmates last year made up two-thirds of all the valley fever cases in Fresno and Kings counties, according to the report to the receiver. MacLean, the Kings County health official, said a key factor is that "prisoners are put in that risk by state policy."

"They don't have a choice," MacLean said.

In the San Joaquin Valley, the disease hits hardest in populations that are not native to the area. MacLean said infections also occur in his county at higher rates at the Lemoore Naval Air Station and among African Americans, who are disproportionately represented in the prison system.

The report to Sillen was prepared by Dr. Dwight Winslow, the prison system's statewide medical director. New construction, Winslow said, is going to cause a problem at the San Joaquin Valley prisons, no matter if the infill program expands their population or merely replaces the emergency beds.

Reported instances of valley fever among inmates in the southern San Joaquin Valley increased more than sixfold from 2001 to 2006, to 672 cases last year, including 514 at Pleasant Valley State Prison and 91 at nearby Avenal State Prison. Officials suspect construction of a new hospital near Pleasant Valley had a role in the big jump in its valley fever rate. It reported only 47 instances of valley fever in 2002.

Dr. Demosthenes Pappagianis of UC Davis Medical School, a leading valley fever expert, said the infill construction program is "likely to expose more susceptibles to valley fever."

"I think it's not advisable," Pappagianis said of the program.

So, what you are saying, Hoover, is that Texas is one smart prison-building state without any feverish problems like they have in California. I agree. Build on.

ha ha

No, I was only trying to illustrate that there are other issues besides monetary at play here.

quote:

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Originally posted by JB:
So, what you are saying, Hoover, is that Texas is one smart prison-building state without any feverish problems like they have in California. I agree. Build on.

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Bravo! Well played.

Just how many tours did you serve in Iraq, Mr. Hoover?

quote:

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Originally posted by Stacey L. Brownlee:
The issue that I have with you is that you are obviously not being honest about your identity or past (need I remind you of your two, no three, no two tours in Iraq).

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He's not answering your question, Stacey B. I think instead of tours in Iraq, Hoover, er, I mean RTC, meant tours in the ACLU.

I suggest ignoring his posts. We all know he ain't no DA. If'n he was, he'd be as concerned about crooks running the streets as we are. We can also assume he is not a parent, due to his protective nature of sex offenders.

When you get despondent over his not responding to questions regarding his identity, you can find some solace in this poem, a work of art borne possibly by years in the bowels of the ACLU, where no one agrees with you but the most criminal lovin' folks:

https://tdcaa.infopop.net/eve/forums?a=tpc&s=347098965&f=457098965&m=5391091751

On an unrelated side note, do you ever wonder how some inmates can get internet access?