NEWS

Letter from Deputy Warden regarding our Programs:

I am absolutely out of my mind to hear of your success with your meditation program.. I have since moved to Arizona and work for the Arizona Department of Corrections in Safford AZ where we have a very high Native American population.. If you are interested in conducting these programs in AZ as a pilot of course, contact me and I will contact my director etc. to set something up.. I have nothing but good things to say about your program as when I was the Deputy Warden in Grants, your program's presence changed the entire lving ambience and the only thing we changed was this class and giving the inmates some privacy with they exercises. Maybe through a grant or something we can work something out for our AZ population as they are growing faster than we can keep up with..
Good to see you coming on strong..

Carl ToersBijns, Deputy Warden
Operations, Safford Complex
596 Cook Rd, Safford Az

Native American Traditional Arts Program Funded for 2008 

In August 2008 we received funding from the Chamiza Foundation to continue our Native American Traditional Arts Program for another year.  Our thanks to the Chamiza Foundation. It was in January of 2005 that Heart Mountain initiated this Program, which has been very popular with the kids.  Youth from all ethnic backgrounds participate in Native dancing, singing, drum making and basket weaving – enjoying pride in the most positive aspects of Native culture, and fostering cross-cultural understanding and respect.  In working with the Santa Fe Youth Authority, we learned that eighty percent of the youth at the local detention center are Native American. Because the facility contracts with pueblos and other reservations throughout the Southwest to take their troubled teens, many of the young inmates are hundreds of miles from home, rendering family visits difficult and infrequent.  These young people are serving sentences ranging from six months to two years.

With the Native American Traditional Arts Program, Heart Mountain has found a way to serve the primarily Native American population at the Juvenile Detention Center. Cochiti Pueblo Elder Arnold Herrera and his two sons, Carlos and Tomas, teach traditional drum making, basket weaving, story telling, singing and dancing to the youth, creating an inclusive sense of family for all the inmates. Mr. Herrera and his sons are renowned master basket weavers and drum makers. This project provides Native American youth an opportunity to connect with and strengthen their cultural traditions and heritage, while youth from other ethnicities learn about neighbors, leading to shared learning, an increase in interpersonal understanding, tolerance, and a sense of community. The program also instills a sense of pride and self-esteem through creating fine baskets and drums, which youth can keep or send to their families, and through singing songs from their respective tribes. 

Heart Mountain Has Created a DVD 

We have exciting news at Heart Mountain – we have created a DVD of our work to share others. We are hoping to bring our model out to other prisons around the country, via our website and DVDs, to show that it can be done anywhere.  The initial DVD, which is already on our site, is our first production, created largely to showcase our current programs, but the final film project will include a model and process for creating a contemplative pod within any prison; more interviews with not only inmates on the inside, but those who have been released and adjusted well back into life on the outside; and interviews with prison administrators who have shared in the development of the pod and seen for themselves what can be done.  Film is our most effective communication medium, so we feel it is the most effective way to convey how to go about creating this kind of specialized unit within a prison. We are currently seeking funding to complete this project, so anyone interesting in supporting this work is invited to contact us.

Grants Meditation Pod Disbanded

Sadly we have been informed that our Meditation Pod at Grants, the first of its kind in the country, after celebrating its sixth year has been disbanded.  This is because of the opening of a new facility in the state, and they wanted to spread these healthier inmates around.  This intensifies our determination to create more such contemplative units in prisons around the state and the country.  We are looking at alternate locations to begin again.

The meditation unit at the Grants, New Mexico men's prison was in its sixth year of successful operation. The unit was created in response to our former Governor's interest in meditation for convicts. Governor Johnson instructed his Secretary of Corrections to look into expanding existing meditation programs within the prison system. We were invited to meet with the Secretary and Charles King, Bureau Chief of Addiction Services. They asked us how the administration could help us with our work. Echoing the requests of several inmates, we suggested that a dormitory be established and dedicated to prisoners committed to meditation and spiritual practice. Two months later the meditation unit opened at the medium security prison in Grants.

It was the only prison dormitory dedicated to meditation in the United States.

The unit housed 16 men of different faiths, who used meditation or yoga as part of their spiritual practice. The Heart Mountain teachers helped the men create their own guidelines for running the pod, such as no TV, no smoking or excessive noise in the common area, and three hour-long silent periods every day. We taught Council process, as a means of collective decision-making, to assist the men in addressing their problems within the pod. It took several months for trust and tolerance to grow, but in time the men agreed that it was a good place to live within the system. They met in council every Friday. Theft and drug use stopped in the unit, and it became a place of mutual support for spiritual growth. Heart Mountain teachers conducted monthly, daylong meditation and yoga workshops for the men.