Prisons across Texas are again feeling the heat this summer, creating dangerous conditions for the inmates — most of whom are nonviolent offenders — serving their time before reentering society, as well those who must report every day to work in those sweltering environs. The majority of Texas’ roughly 100 prison facilities don’t have air conditioning, which makes for excruciating conditions during these ever-hotter summer months for those living and working inside these buildings.
Periods of excessive heat contribute to significant increases in violence, suicide incidents and deaths among incarcerated individuals. Pam Lychner State Jail in Humble, for example, had 15 triple-digit days inside its housing areas last summer. These are the conditions that hundreds of staff and roughly 2,000 incarcerated individuals at Lychner had to endure.
That wasn’t even the worst case. The Garza West prison in Beeville had 42 days exceeding 100 degrees indoors.
Replicate these experiences across the 66 other Texas Department of Criminal Justice facilities that still lack sufficient indoor-climate controls, and you get a sense of the severity of the problem. The situation is not limited to the incarcerated population. Staffing is already a critical challenge for TDCJ. We’ve seen major problems, including prison escapes, associated with the agency being short-staffed.
Even though there have been improvements, TDCJ still has some of the worst turnover rates among state agencies, essentially tied for second behind the juvenile justice system. Despite serious investments to improve staff retention, including pay raises for correctional staff and improving correctional officer safety, the effects of extreme heat on correctional officers’ workplace environment plays a key role in staffing challenges.
In testimony before the Legislature in 2022, TDCJ’s executive director testified that working in air-conditioned spaces would improve recruitment and retention. There are real legal liabilities here, too. The record heatwave in 2011 caused multiple deaths and led to a multiyear lawsuit, in which a judge concluded the extreme heat within one prison unit violated the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. That case’s settlement ended up costing taxpayers millions in legal fees, exceeding the installation cost of the air conditioning at that particular unit. Fast forward to today, and we have a very similar lawsuit calling for climate-control systems in the remaining prison units. For decades, state law required that county jails keep their facilities within a reasonable temperature range, no higher than 85 degrees.
Federal prisons must be kept no higher than 79 degrees. This requirement, however, does not apply to state prisons. In 2023, the average in-prison temperature exceeded 90 degrees on 69 days, to the detriment of the safety of incarcerated Texans and staff alike.
Last legislative session, legislators set aside $85.7 million to install enough air conditioning to cool roughly 11,000 inmate beds. While a significant investment, that still leaves well over 85,000 inmate living quarters without air conditioning. This problem is not going away, and half-measures are not going to cut it. For the sake of incarcerated Texans and the publicsafety professionals who work there, Texas needs to fully commit to a plan to install climate control systems in all its prisons.
If we don’t, just like the temperature, the cost in tax dollars and human lives will continue to rise.
Soberon is a policy advisor at Texas 2036.
