San Mateo County Jail Inmates Stage Hunger Strike

REDWOOD CITY, CA — Inmates at San Mateo County’s main jail are staging a hunger strike over conditions amid the coronavirus crisis, the Sheriff’s Office announced Friday in a news release.

The inmates are protesting costs of commissary items, lack of free phone calls during the pandemic, and access to a remote video visitation system at the Maguire Correctional Facility in Redwood City, Lt. Stephanie Josephson said

“We discovered that our commissary vendor charges prices that are higher than those of other local jails,” Josephson said.

“We have worked with our vendor and have agreed to lower the prices to match those of the other jails.”

Josephson said all revenues from commissary fund inmate programs and commissary personnel.
The jail contracts inmate phone services with an outside vendor that currently charges 4.5 cents a minute.

“Upon the onset of COVID 19, the Sheriff’s Office began working with our tablet partners to establish remote video visits” Josephson said.

“This has been an enormous undertaking as we have not provided that service in the past. We do experience technical issues. We are committed to finding solutions to remote video visits and are hopeful they will enhance the inmate family unification process.”

During the pandemic, every inmate receives two 30-minute video visitation sessions per week at no cost, Josephson said.