Good behavior musn’t determine if a California prison inmate lives in a safe environment

Re: “California prisoners sleep with ‘one eye open.’ Should they have their own cells?”

In December 2025, I read a news story in CalMatters that appears, at first glance, to address the failure of recent legislation — Assembly Bill 1140, authored by San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins and Assemblymember Damon Connolly — mandating the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation create a single occupancy cell pilot program at four state prisons. 

While the article correctly acknowledges the dangers of double occupancy cells within California prisons, it is a part of a growing trend that suggests single cells might be used to incentivize good behavior. 

We in The People In Blue, a committee of incarcerated advocates at San Quentin, believe it is imperative to create safe and healthy conditions for those who work and live in California’s prisons. We were the first organization to call for a complete culture change in the prison system, including single occupancy cells, for several reasons. 

First, double occupancy cells are a hazard, as correctly acknowledged by the California Peace Officers Association: “The threat of violence and tension in shared cells … fosters conflict among cellmates, necessitating intervention from correctional officers, who place themselves in Jeopardy, thereby escalating the overall risk within the facility for all parties involved.” 

Second, we who were housed in San Quentin during the COVID pandemic understand all too well the dangers of double occupancy cells. Marin County Superior Court Judge Geoffrey M. Howard said of double occupancy cells: “The court can conceive of no argument to support forcing inmates to remain in a cell smaller than 50 square feet, with two bunks and a cellmate for virtually 24 hours a day, seven days a week, for months on end. Doing so enhanced the inmates’ exposure to COVID-19.” 

Officers also were sickened by the conditions, which led to one officer’s death. 

Third, all parties weighing in on the issue agree, single occupancy cells would allow incarcerated people to sleep without fear of violence and to engage in rehabilitative programming, while also promoting safer work environments for correctional officers and staff. 

But incentivizing good behavior with single occupancy cells as a reward is a circular argument with no end. 

As an incarcerated person with 31 years of continuous incarceration in double occupancy cells, I have experienced each of the negative aspects of shared cell living identified in the article. To receive the health benefits of a single cell I must exhibit proper “good behavior,” but I can never be good long enough to be placed in a single occupancy cell because of the constant threat of violence I experience from living in a shared cell.

Double occupancy cells cause a wide range of health and safety issues, which can be cured by  allowing incarcerated people to access single occupancy cells. 

The duty of California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to protect is absolute and not dependent on the “good behavior” of the incarcerated person. Therefore, single cells cannot and should not be used as a reward for good behavior. 

Additionally, there is no need for a pilot program when research already exists that clearly acknowledges the harm done by the current living conditions. 

An incarcerated person’s constitutional right to a safe and healthy environment cannot be withheld on the condition that she or he be good. Single cells can and should be a right that can be achieved without additional spending or expanding prison capacity.