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The Trump Administration has opted to use an Army base in Oklahoma to hold growing numbers of immigrant children in its custody after running out of room at government shelters.
Fort Sill, an 150-year-old installation once used as an internment camp for Japanese-Americans during World War II, has been selected to detain 1,400 children until they can be given to an adult relative, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
— Time.com
As of April 30, 2019, the department of Health and Human Services has taken 40,900 children seeking asylum into custody along the southern border, a 57% increase from 2018, according to Time. The surge in detainees has overwhelmed existing and new temporary detention facilities in southern... View full entry
The Architecture Lobby and Architects/Designers/Planners for Social Responsibility have issued a joint statement condemning the Justice Department's widely criticized zero-tolerance immigration enforcement policy that has led to the separation of thousands of children from their parents... View full entry
space and building costs are just as much of guiding principles in designing real prisons as they are in Prison Architect. [...]
"Prisoners themselves are generally not included in the conversation where the prison construction budget is allocated to different priorities, so their needs come last and cell size is generally set at the legal minimum," Sperry said. "The legal standard only bars 'cruel or unusual punishment'—a cell can be punitively small as long as it doesn't cross that limit."
— motherboard.vice.com
More on the discussion around prison architecture:How one California prison is betting on architecture to decrease recidivism ratesArchitecture of correction: Rikers IslandThe NYT on prison architecture and ethicsHow Prison Architecture Can Transform Inmates' LivesADPSP and the Architecture of... View full entry
Amelia conducted an interview with John Szot answering questions on Architecture and the Unspeakable, a triptych of short, magnificently animated films.News Professor Andrew Ross, penned an editorial High Culture and Hard Labor regarding Guggenheim Museum’s Saadiyat Island project. Later... View full entry
It might not seem like an architect’s area of expertise to reform inhumane prison conditions. But like attorneys, journalists and doctors, architects have a code of professional ethics. They’re required to “uphold human rights in all of their professional endeavors.”
Architect Raphael Sperry says that prisons designed for prolonged solitary confinement violate the human rights of the inmates, and that he and other architects are ethically bound to do something about it.
— thestory.org
Previously on Archinect: Design Against Prisons The Architecture of Juvenile Detention in America Prison Architect and the moral dilemmas of a prison simulator View full entry
in professional practice, there’s a tendency to lose track of the initial spark that drew us to the profession and fall into a routine of designing similar projects for a familiar client type without thinking too deeply about it. It’s hard to make any money in the profession without a certain amount of repetition and standardization. So when a project comes along that challenges your values, that would be a good time to reconnect with the reasons you got into your profession in the first place. — thepolisblog.org
polis has published an interview with Raphael Sperry, former president of ADPSR, and founder of the Alternatives to Incarceration / Prison Design Boycott Campaign. View full entry