Nearly 100 incarcerated people at Sonoma County Jail are in the middle of a four-day hunger strike to pressure officials to restart in-person visits. Inmates have been barred from seeing relatives and friends for over a year because of the pandemic.
The 92 participants in the all-male housing module began their hunger strike on Wednesday.
“It is extremely important for people in the jail to have contact with the outside world and connection with their loved ones,” said Karlene Navarro, director of the county’s Independent Office of Law Enforcement Review and Outreach. “I think that we have to acknowledge that and do whatever we can to give them that connection, but at the same time balance it with safety to make sure there isn’t an outbreak in the jail.”
Jail officials, she said, have yet to set a concrete date for when visits can resume.
The county jail is also taking precautions to ensure the strikers’ safety, with medical staff checking their vital signs every day, Navarro said.
The Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office is working with the county health department to determine what COVID-19 safety protocols need to be implemented to safely resume visitations, Navarro added. Proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test are two of the main requirements under discussion.
“They will probably go with one visitor at a time and stagger visitation to reduce the number of people in the jail at once, but nothing concrete has been decided on,” she said.
The jail experienced a major outbreak of the virus in December, but the number of new cases have since dropped markedly.
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is set to resume allowing in-person visiting — with significant restrictions — at some of its state-run facilities on April 10.