As inflation spikes throughout the United States, incarcerated people in Texas are feeling a hard blast. But the family and friends who have a loved one incarcerated are suffering also as their resources are taking a substantial hit. Communicating has become an expensive entity. Phone calls and emails via Securus are a needed expenditure that is crippling Americans’ already diminishing finances. Rising prices in the economy are making funds limited in many households. Phone calls in Texas prisons have a six cents a minute tax rate for a 30 minute phone call. What is supposed to be $1.80 phone call, as advertised, turns out to be a $2.69 phone call. Where did the extra 89 cents go?
Just imagine: a week’s worth of phone calls, talking once a day, totals to about $20. A month’s worth of phone calls talking once a day is about $80. This equals to about the same amount people pay for a monthly cell phone bill. 20 emails, which cost 50 cents each, to send communication with a loved one incarcerated, has become an additional bill to pay monthly. Emails are supposed to be instant message but sometimes [take] nine days to reach its recipient, which sometimes require the recipient to pay a fee to read the email.
Communicating is a precious necessity that is being exploited and monopolized, putting families in debt, while industries such as Securus Advanced Tech profit exorbitantly. With 1.9 million people within the United States incarcerated, Texas makes up about 1/5 of that percentage. Expenses total up to maybe $5.6 billion a year for families to communicate with their incarcerated loved ones. With no economic relief, nowhere in sight, high-priced communications is taking its toll.
In 2022 Congress passed the Martha Wright Reed Act that directed the FCC to issue a new set of regulations governing incarcerated people’s communications service providers. In 2024 FCC issued those regulations to no avail. 2026 and communication expenses are still astronomical. Where is the relief and what is the remedy? Through resilience, I persevere. We need reform, protection, ethical conduct, and solidarity. Communicating from the barriers of solitary confinement, this is female to male transgender Xandan Gulley for Prison Radio.
These commentaries are recorded by Prison Radio.
