The Oregon State Penitentiary in Salem. (Ron Cooper/Oregon Capital Chronicle)
To combat the flow of drugs into prisons, the Oregon Department of Corrections is considering a change to its mail rules that would prohibit inmates from receiving letters written with colored pencils or markers while only permitting white envelopes and paper.
The proposed change comes as state prison officials seek to stop drugs from entering Oregon’s prison system, which has 12 facilities that handled nearly 1 million pieces of mail last year for some 12,000 people in custody. One pathway – but not the only one – is for drugs to enter prisons through the mail, sometimes disguised or shrouded with bright colors on paper and drawings.
“We’re finding so much contraband that is disguised by the use of crayons, colored pencils, colored paper,” Mike Reese, director of the Oregon Department of Corrections, said in an interview with the Capital Chronicle. “And we’re just finding more and more with fentanyl and other drugs.”
But the proposed rule change also has drawn criticism. In the agency’s administrative rule hearing on Monday, advocates and families of people in custody spoke out against the proposal. They said the change reaches too far and blocks children from sharing their handwritten, colorful drawings with their mothers in custody.
The agency has not made a final decision on the rule change. The agency will take feedback until Sept. 25 and make a decision later this year.
About the change
Under the proposal, any nonwhite envelopes would be banned. Colored envelopes and those made of cardboard would also not be permitted.
Mail in envelopes that do not follow the rules would be rejected by mailroom employees and returned, unopened, to the sender.
Mailroom staff open letters to check for contraband, but with some exceptions: If they are sent to or from attorneys, health care providers or the corrections ombudsman, a governor-appointed watchdog with the legal authority to investigate complaints about prisons.
Reese said the system wants to help people who have an addiction: “We want to make sure that we have a sober environment that allows them to heal and to be successful.”
Oregon – and much of the country ii is in the throes of a fentanyl epidemic, with about 1,400 Oregonians dying of overdoses in 2023, Oregon Health Authority data shows.
A relatively small amount can kill someone, too. Just two milligrams of fentanyl, small enough to fit on the tip of a pencil, is potentially lethal.
Reese said everyone needs to be protected: those in custody, prison staff and postal employees who process mail. Outside Oregon, prison mail and drugs have proven lethal. A federal Bureau of Prisons correctional officer in California died in August after he opened up a letter tainted with narcotics, suspected to be fentanyl. Three people were charged in connection with a scheme to introduce drugs into that prison.
“We’re doing everything we can to enhance the safety of our institutions at a moment when we’re seeing so many people in the community dealing with addiction issues, particularly with fentanyl,” Reese said.
Elizabeth Coleman, the behavioral health services manager at Two Rivers Correctional Institution in Umatilla, said the drugs pose a danger for people in custody as well as others who can be exposed, like their family and other staff.
“Anecdotally, every single week when we review misconducts, there’s at least one of someone trying – someone who got it in – something caught in the mailroom,” Coleman said in an interview.
The drugs can include fentanyl as well as heroin and spice, a designer drug meant to mimic the psychoactive compound in marijuana. Like drugs outside prisons, those inside can be tainted with fentanyl.
Coleman said she also recognizes the morale boost that connections with families provide.
“We want that connection to start, and also we want to keep people safe, everybody safe,” Coleman said.
Opponents weigh in
Advocates, former inmates and family members raised concerns about the proposed changes.
Mariana Garcia Medina, a senior policy associate with the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon, said the proposal would limit the ability of adults to have constructive communications with the outside world, including their families.
The proposed changes would impact their mental health and impose restrictions that can violate the Oregon constitutional protections for people in custody to not face “unnecessary rigor,” she said.
Others said unrestricted mail with family was crucial to their well-being.
Angela Kim, a legal assistant with the Oregon Justice Resource Center’s Women’s Justice Project, spoke about her experience while incarcerated at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility. Her children lived in California, she said, and personal drawings and notes were valued.
“I received cards, drawings and letters, and each one was a treasure,” she said. “I have saved every one of them.”
Opponents also said the proposal could block people from receiving mail from other organizations that use colored envelopes.
“The strictness of the new requirements may also be difficult for some families to comply with, especially those with limited means to purchase the right papers and envelopes,” Kim said.
Kim said the agency has not released data on how widespread the drug problem was through the mail. Agency officials did not provide the Capital Chronicle with data on Monday, though officials said anecdotally that it is a common issue.
Alisha Price, of Great Falls, Montana, whose husband is in an Oregon prison, also testified during the meeting. Their two children, both teenagers, love sending him cards and writing letters, Price said. They can only go see him about twice a year, she said.
“Without the letters and stuff, he would go absolutely crazy,” Price said. “It’s already making him absolutely crazy.”
Mary Pierce, a peer support specialist in Josephine County who works with Welcome Home Oregon, a re-entry group for formerly incarcerated people, said brightly colored envelopes can bolster morale for people languishing in prison.
“It makes all the difference in the world when coming underneath your door or onto your bunk there’s that bright colored envelope coming from a friend or family,” said Pierce, who was incarcerated 10 years at Coffee Creek Correctional Facility. “So I’m just asking that all of these things would be taken into consideration.”
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