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Court Forces Florida Prisons To Go Kosher
May 4, 2015
After more than a decade of legal wrangling, a federal judge has ordered the Florida Department of Corrections to provide kosher meals to inmates, rejecting the state’s argument that the religious diet is prohibitively expensive.
Corrections officials are already serving the kosher meals but have refused to acknowledge that they are required to do so under the federal “Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act” law enacted in 2000.
The U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against the agency three years ago as part of a drawn-out fight over the kosher meals, an option not only for Jewish prisoners but for Muslim and Seventh-Day Adventists whose religions also proscribe dietary restrictions.
The lawsuit challenged corrections officials’ claim that they were not required to provide the meals, as well as the rules the agency used to determine who was eligible to receive the meals.
About 10,000 inmates receive kosher meals now being served at all of the state’s institutions, and corrections officials have no plans to discontinue the special diet, according to Department of Corrections spokesman McKinley Lewis.
“If you want a kosher meal, you can have a kosher meal,” he said.
The department started offering the kosher meals in 2004 to Jewish prisoners at 13 facilities and transferred inmates who were eligible for the meals to those institutions. The agency expanded the program to inmates of all faiths in 2006 but halted it the following year before reinstating it as a pilot project at a single prison in 2010, serving fewer than 20 prisoners.
A year after the lawsuit was filed, the department again began serving kosher meals and promised to have the meals available to all inmates by last July.
Last summer, the department switched to all-cold meals, consisting largely of peanut butter and sardines, served twice a day, prompting some inmates to complain that the unappetizing diet was aimed at discouraging prisoners from signing up for the plan.
“…It is hard to understand how defendants can have a compelling state interest in not spending money that they are already voluntarily spending on the exact thing they claim to have an interest in not providing,” U.S. District Judge Patricia Seitz wrote in a 31-page opinion.
“Furthermore, not only are defendants voluntarily spending the money on providing kosher meals, they have repeatedly represented that they are committed to providing kosher meals” and that the current religious diet plan is sustainable, both monetarily and security-wise, the judge wrote. “Thus, defendants’ compelling state interest argument is substantially dampened by its voluntary decision to provide kosher meals.”
The kosher meals cost about $3.56 per inmate per day, compared to $1.89 per day for regular meals. The department estimated that the costs for making kosher meals available to all inmates could total between $384,000 and $12.3 million, depending on how many inmates signed up for the program and decided to stick with it.
But even the department’s “worst-case scenario” estimate equates to just .005 of its total annual budget, Seitz wrote.
“Clearly, in pure numbers these amounts are not insignificant. However, in an overall budget of nearly $2.3 billion per year, these amounts are relatively small,” Seitz wrote.
While nearly 10,000 prisoners — about 10 percent of the total inmate population — receive kosher meals today, corrections officials expect participation in the program to decline to about 1.5 to 2 percent. In the five prisons where the meals have been served for a full year, the participation rate dropped by one third.
The department, which has spent more than $400,000 in legal costs fighting the lawsuit, last year contended that the kosher meals were prohibitively expensive.
If just 1.5 to 2 percent of the total prison population joined the program, the department would spend up to $1.7 million a year, not including extra costs for disposable utensils and plates, lawyers for the department wrote in a brief last year.
“For a cash-strapped agency like the Department of Corrections, these amounts are not a ‘relatively minor expense,’ given other crucial needs that compete for funds,” Florida Assistant Attorney General Lisa Kuhlman Tietig wrote.
But the department’s lawyers failed to show that the cost of the program has affected prison operations in any way, Seitz wrote.
“There is no evidence that any program s have been cut, that any staff has been cut, or that there has been any harm to any aspect of defendants’ operations,” she wrote.
Seitz also ordered the department to stop using a “zero-tolerance” policy that removed inmates from the kosher meal plan if they were caught eating regular meals or purchasing non-kosher food from the canteen, something corrections officials have already abandoned.
And Seitz also ruled that prison officials can’t kick inmates off of the kosher plan if the inmates miss 10 percent or more of their meals in a month, another policy the department has discontinued.
Seitz criticized the department for complaining about the costs of the special diet but not using its own policies to restrict who receives the meals.
“Defendants have at their disposal an alternative means to contain costs without burdening the religious exercise of those prisoners with a sincere religious belief requiring them to keep kosher. To date, however, defendants have actively chosen not to use these alternative cost reduction methods,” she wrote.
by Dara Kam, The News Service of Florida
Pictured: The cafeteria at Century Correctional Institution. NorthEscambia.com file photo, click to enlarge.
Comments
23 Responses to “Court Forces Florida Prisons To Go Kosher”
Unfortunately, it’s the law. If you want it changed, take a look at your lawmakers and vote them out if they are for this nonsense. I work in a prison that serves “Certified Food Sincerity Meals” – Kosher in other words. I don’t think they need the coddling myself, but since it’s currently the law, it must be done and the court decided accurately. To get rid of it, the law will have to be changed.
This is a load of crap! There are senior citizens who have worked all their lives and are forced to choose between eating, paying their bills or buying their medication. It is prison! Deal with it. No prisoner should be entitled to anymore than what is pertinent to their survival. EVERY PRISONER in America should be made to work and contribute back to society.
Kosher meals cause a huge security problem inside the prison system. This was tried and failed. The requirements to make a meal kosher are extremely expensive. In an effort to control some of the expense, only some prisons were given the kosher kitchens. The end result was that gang members were changing their religion so they had to be fed the kosher meals. Therefore they were transferred to the kosher prisons, where their other gang members were housed. It was next to impossible to segregate these trouble makers and security along with public safety is compromised.
The Kosher meals create other problems beside financial for the state. When a dorm comes out for a meal, the koshers have to be in a group. On our shift, they used to go to the front of the line. So half the line is lying saying they are kosher to get in the chow hall sooner. So then you put them at the end of the line and you still have inmates lying so they can sit by their buds. We have list and could utilize it. However they are not required to come out and eat. So in the morning, in the dark you will be hunting for names and that is not the safest way with only 2 people with approximately 80 inmates ( sometimes more and sometimes less) on the yard escorting. It is difficult and causes security issues along with the money issue. All I want to know…..is how many were kosher when they were on the outside? Before, during or after their crime? But still for me, the safety concerns are real. When your eyes ain’t on an inmate, they notice and I love me and my co-workers. Just venting.
How about DOC moving all the inmates that require “kosher” meals to the same facility, That way all the kitchens wouldn’t have to cook to order. For the “Kosher” facility, i’d pick the one in the middle of the everglades.
If an inmate cannot consume a “non-kosher” meal for whatever reason, that inmate is under no obligation to eat it. You deal with your hardships and I’ll deal with mine.
Apparently their religion has no rules against breaking the law.
I am glad that this finally went through. Who are we to criticize? A lot of these inmates are locked up for petty drug crimes and even crimes they did not commit. I hope they finally pass the proposed college credit and degree initiative so inmates can earn their degrees while locked up. That is a good proposal because it helps these guys to be competitive in the job market upon release.
Unto the pure all things are pure: but unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure; but even their mind and conscience is defiled. They profess that they know God; but in works they deny him, being abominable, and disobedient, and unto every good work reprobate. Titus 1:15-16 kjv
Here’s a nice kosher meal for you inmates!!!
Why does every governmental decision make me sick ?
WITH THE SWEAT OF THOU BROW SHALL THOU EAT BREAD (day old) and water
If inmates eat regular meals or purchase non-kosher food,
WHY can’t they eat it ALL THE TIME ???
Doesn’t sound too religious to me.
Just in case I get thrown in the pokie in the future, my religion says that I have to eat Hardee’s Monster Thickburgers.
These “demands” should come under separation of church and state,when a person enters the United States penal system their rights end at the entrance.The only “right” they should be given is no cruel and unusual punishment,not a diet of their choosing…….guess God forbid I should land in the hooskow I’d like the Jimmy Buffett diet of oysters and beer(and a cheese burger)
REGARDING:
“another judge that thinks they are god. She needs to get a real job, one she can handle.”
“This is just plain wrong”
“I am really tired of inmates getting so much special treatment.”
“under the federal “Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act” law enacted in 2000.”
The judge is chosen to see that the government complies with its own laws.
(Criminals are in prison — rightly — because THEY didn’t.)
The laws were enacted by our elected representatives.
Why be mad at the judge for doing her job?
Would you rather governments ignore any law they don’t like?
(And the kosher beans comment was correct. It isn’t inherently more expensive.)
David for just judges
and better beans
I am really tired of inmates getting so much special treatment. How about give some treatment to the men and women who work in these facilities. We are hearing all this negative about how there is misconduct in prison against the PRISIONERS but has anyone really seen what some of the prisoners do to the officers. And the officers cannot do or say anything because the PRISIONERS will say the opposite. It is an awful system where out here in the real world we have people working their butts off to provide for themself and their family and they just hope they can provide 3 meals and these PRISONERS are getting special meals. They are already getting free education and other luxuries that hard working people cannot afford. Prion is just to cushy for them.
Feed them Kosher Beans and Rice . End of expense problem.
this is what’s wrong with our systems,, You have drug dealers , murders, thieves being bowed down to and given every thing they need to be comfortable
Mean while hard working men and women are footing the bill for the life of pleasure,,
I say basic meals 1 meat , and 2 vegtables , If they do not like it go tell it to the family of the person they destroyed their life,, see if any sympathy comes from them,,
They are in prison for a reason , not to be catered to,, I’ll go one step farther,, Prisons should be self supporting like they use to be,, Let them grow their own foods and work the fields like they did back in the 50s and 60s ,, A little manual labor will not hurt them
Holy Cats….next the “Offended – Entitled – Offender” will be able to only eat food made by their Grandma.
For Pete’s Sake….they are in JAIL / PRISON not some dang high class Spa for a Vacation…..Uh, wait a minute….maybe they are.
Maybe if WE did not allow OUR leadership to so foolishly spend taxpayer money the lure of jails would be less.
I wonder how religious they were while doing their crimes?
This is just plain wrong, you telling me inmates actually think they’re owed this, fight to get on this program then want other meals, tell them when they bring back those families loved ones that they killed or give back the innocence to the ones they raped & tortured, they can have them or else let the inmates families pay for them, they’re supposed to be in there for punishment not spending time @ the tajs mahal, give em a early retirement instead & that’ll save the state millions, I must sound cruel & out of my mind, well, I’m not, but I just bet this could be a kick in the teeth for the families who have deceased or hurt family members, they pay taxes too, now they have to pay for kosher meals for these low lives, yeah go ahead, reward them because to hear inmates, they ain’t done nutten, ain’t hurt nobody, they was the ones that was done wrong, they was framed. Sounds like em
That’s the Feds once again ruling on something that is not their business because it’s not a Constitutional matter.
Patricia Seitz, another judge that thinks they are god. She needs to get a real job, one she can handle.