Women inside California's prisons have limited access to healthy food and exercise and they are isolated from outside communities. The garden project will solve a number of problems related to these issues. The garden will provide fresh produce and a rehabilitative activity for the women in the prison which will hopefully improve their physical and mental health. It also builds connections between the women inside and the outside community. This can give the women access to educational, rehabilitative and occupational resources that they would not otherwise have. In addition, as the garden is deeply rooted in organic and sustainable practices; this addresses environmental problems at a grass-roots level. Women inside of CIW rarely have fresh fruits and vegetables in their diets. This greatly contributes to nutrition related diseases inside the prison such as obesity and diabetes. The garden will provide fresh fruits and vegetables to supplement the diets of the women in the prison.

The California Institution for Women (CIW) is located 35 minutes from the Claremont Colleges, but until the 5C Criminal Justice Network was founded, very few students or faculty were even aware of its existence. This project is important to us because, as a group, we have built a relationship with the women at CIW. We consider the Garden Project to be a culmination of our past efforts to connect our campus community with the women of CIW and the most promising means of creating a sustainable partnership between these two communities in the future.

This project is composed of three phases: planning, planting, and program implementation. The first phase addressed the initial logistical needs: once the initial funding was secured, project leaders began meeting regularly with the administration of the CIW to select a garden site, secure administrative sponsorship and ensure access to supplies on the prison grounds. Additionally outreach efforts were central to building a large volunteer base at the Claremont Colleges and CIW. The project is currently in its second stage, which consists of planting and preparation. For the past two months, there have been bi-weekly sessions at the garden site to prepare the garden for planting. In these sessions students and the women at CIW work side-by-side, weeding and digging beds. The garden project has also sponsored garden parties, at Claremont colleges to start seedlings for the prison garden. This allows the project to utilize the resources of the student gardens and green houses on campus. Within the next year, the garden project will move to its third phase, including scaling up the level of production from the garden to produce enough food so that it can be frequently used in the prison’s kitchen.