To Chairwoman Manchester, Vice Chair Brenner, Ranking Member Weinstein, and members of the Senate Government Oversight Committee, thank you for this opportunity to provide written testimony in support of House Bill 29.
The ACLU of Ohio is happy to lend its support to this bipartisan bill to ensure those incarcerated in Ohio’s prisons and jails are provided with adequate feminine hygiene supplies and products.
Passage of HB 29 will significantly improve the well-being and dignity of people incarcerated in our state. We thank the sponsors, Reps. Humphrey and John, for their leadership and this committee for its careful consideration of this bill and the issues it raises relevant to mass incarceration.
It is important to note HB 29 protects not only those who are serving time in prisons and jails after being convicted for crimes but also those in our jails who are there pre-trial, having not yet been convicted of anything.
We also feel compelled to once again point out Ohio is one of the top incarcerators of its people on the entire planet, with a prison system that has been operating over capacity for decades and many of our local jails struggling financially and logistically with populations above the capacities of many of those facilities.
Of course, potential solutions do exist. Common sense bail reform would ensure Ohio remains safe but without continuing to keep people locked up simply because they do not have the money to be released. Indeed, in some counties pre-trial populations exceed 50% of the entire jail population.
As well, the number one reason a person enters an Ohio prison is for Drug Possession. This has been the case for 10+ years here, a perpetuation of the thoroughly failed War on Drugs Ohio has never abandoned.
We raise these issues because we realize some may express concern about the financial and capacity costs of providing fuller access to these products to your incarcerated constituents. But, not only is it incumbent on jail and prison staff to provide these products for simple human dignity reasons but also because there are numerous ways any costs can be offset via smaller and larger reforms to sentencing and prison and jail conditions, should that be an actual concern.
As always, the ACLU of Ohio stands ready to assist legislators with these goals. But, for now, we strongly support the much-needed House Bill 29 and we encourage its passage by this committee.