Complaints, lodged in letters to Herald, detail ‘poor quality,’ ‘uncooked’ meals

By Donna Beth Weilenman
Staff Reporter

Five minors incarcerated in Solano County Juvenile Hall have written and mailed letters to The Herald complaining about the food they’re served — and the facility’s superintendent says those complaints have been relayed to the company that makes the food.

“I am a minor at the Solano County Juvenile Detention Facility and I’m writing you on the behalf of me and the other minors,” one letter said. “I’m writing you because I want to do something about our food that we have to eat.”

“We eat food that is watered down or even uncooked,” wrote another resident of the Fairfield facility.

“Not only is the food of poor quality, but we are fed minimal amounts of food, which leave all of us hungry throughout the day,” wrote another.

All the letter writers, whose names are being withheld because they are younger than 18, said they had found pebbles, small twigs and a pincher bug in their meals. Some said their food was cold, and others said it had been burned.

Superintendent Richard Watson said some of the complaints are because the juvenile residents want fast food burgers and pizza instead of menus that meet their balanced nutritional requirements. When criticism is valid, or when he personally sees meals that don’t look appealing, Watson said he tells the vendor Aramark, and expects a written explanation about how the company is making corrections.

After examining copies of the youths’ letters with the writers’ names blanked out, Watson said the correspondence may have been a civics experiment.

The letters began arriving at The Benicia Herald in large manila envelopes the week of April 14 from Juvenile Hall, 740 Beck Ave., Fairfield, where about 80 teenagers currently are housed.

Some of the youths wrote that their parents pay $37.50 each day the teen is incarcerated; one said, “Word around the juvenile hall says that our meals only cost 25 cents a meal.”

Watson said each meal costs $3 or more. It costs Solano County $200 a day for each youth incarcerated at Juvenile Hall, he said.

“We charge parents $32 a day, or 17 percent of the costs,” he said, but rarely do more than 15 percent actually make such payments. “So, generally speaking, they’re not paying” — and taxpayers and donors make up the difference.

Aramark, which supplies food to universities, sports and entertainment venues and school districts as well as correctional institutions around the country, has been providing full entrees to the juvenile hall for about 18 months, Watson said. It’s less expensive than when meals were prepared on-site, he said.

The food is precooked, then frozen, and arrives at the Santa Rita Jail, where an assembly line monitored by Aramark employees assembles the individual meals. Allergies, religious restrictions and other special diets are accommodated.

When the meals arrive at the juvenile hall, portions that should be served warm are heated, then slid into rolling hot carts that can keep food warm for hours. The carts are used to deliver the meals.

“It’s served warm,” Watson assured.

There have been no twigs or leaves other than grape stems and tomato leaves, Watson said, and he disputed claims about a bugs in the food.

When a youth said he found rat droppings in a meal, Watson said he inspected the food and found it was black beans — not harmful, but Watson had them discontinued because the meal wasn’t prepared correctly. And he said the “pebbles” were peas that, like the black beans, had been overcooked.

Watson has told Aramark when service was unacceptable and has made complaints himself, he said, such as when he found hairs in food, an incident the children didn’t mention. “I notified Aramark and made sure they were wearing hair nets,” he said.

When he found some soupy-looking food, Watson learned that a cook at Santa Rita “went off-menu,” and he told Aramark to correct the problem.

There have been times when food has been reheated too long, he said, so the reheating methods have been adjusted. But he disagreed with the youth who said they were being starved.

“They’re getting between 2,700 and 3,000 calories a day. They get nutritionally balanced meals, three meals a day and a snack at night,” he said.

There have been brushes with health officials. “We got dinged by the health department for the tossed salad. We were serving three-quarters of a cup instead of a cup,” Watson said. Since then, the children receive a cup of salad, but to Watson’s dismay, “They don’t eat it anyway.”

“It’s not a four-star restaurant,” he said. “It is done (on an) assembly line.” When one youth complained to him, Watson said, he advised the child the best way to avoid Juvenile Hall food was to stay out of trouble so he wouldn’t have to be incarcerated.

One letter-writer said his Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day suppers were a cold-cut sandwich, and that he was told it was a special meal.

“What he didn’t tell you was that for lunch, they had a holiday meal with all the trimmings,” Watson said. A juvenile hall employee said the children received turkey and ham, with the usual set of holiday side dishes, including dessert, for Thanksgiving.

One day last week, the children’s lunch included hamburgers with trimmings and packaged sauces, and sliced baked potatoes. They had a choice of milks. One employee was baking chocolate chip cookies to be distributed later in the afternoon. The after-supper snack was oranges.

Noting that the hall is inspected regularly by judges, the fire marshal and the health department — not only for food but for many other aspects of the inmates’ lives — Watson said, “We’re within the state guidelines. We can’t feed them all day long. We don’t put a lot of fat in the food.” He said he doesn’t change food for inspectors or such visitors as county supervisors.

District 2 Supervisor Linda Seifert, who sits on the county juvenile justice committee, has eaten at the Juvenile Hall. She said she recently visited the hall campus.

Seifert said Solano County switched food vendors last year because it was looking for a good food service while saving on cost, and determined that Aramark was serving an adequate amount of healthy food.

“As part of the process, we look at quantity and quality. I like to believe it’s a healthy diet,” she said, adding that when she toured the juvenile hall, she found it spotless.

Watson said the juvenile hall has no commissary, nor does it allow unauthorized food from parents to be served to individuals, for two reasons: First, any food brought in from the outside would have to be inspected and tested; and second, if one child began getting extras regularly from his family, other children might interpret it as favoritism.

One teenager wrote to The Herald that his friend had lost 40 pounds in three months during incarceration, adding, “I have received expert opinion that such a drastic loss over so short a period of time is extremely unhealthy.”

Watson responded, “They get four hours of exercise, and they’re seen by the nurse regularly, especially if they’re on a medication.” The nurse would have noticed if a child had lost an unhealthy amount of weight, he said.

The hall has an infirmary with a fully-stocked pharmacy and an isolation room.

Some of the youths do lose weight, because they’re given regimented exercise, which is new to some of them. “Most have not taken physical education before,” Watson said. They also play games, such as basketball and volleyball, on enclosed and roofed outdoor courts as well as on an enclosed grassy playing field.

The youths are divided into living areas called pods that would resemble dormitories except for the sparse bedrooms. In most of the pods, which are named after trees, the children’s rooms are concrete block walls, with the beds also made of concrete block topped with a mattress. A stainless steel toilet is mounted on one wall.

Each pod has a common room with tables, books and television screens. Posted around the common room are pictures of acceptable hair styles and attire, as well as unacceptable ones. Rules also are posted, as well as inspirational guidelines that encourage children to rethink their behavior.

Some youths are admitted not for crimes, but because of drug or alcohol problems. Those enter the juvenile hall’s rehabilitation program.

Each youth receives daily schooling in classrooms that resemble public school rooms. Watson said he thinks the letters were written as part of a civics lesson. He noted that the youths called themselves “minors” and used other language that his own 16-year-old son rarely used.

But he had no problem with the letters. While incoming mail and visitors are examined closely — another reason why food service also is strictly monitored and controlled — the children are allowed to send letters to others.

Most of the residents at the hall will stay an average of about 16 days. Some have been there longer, and some are awaiting transfer to adult prison.

Some of the youths have committed burglaries; others have robbed people. Some have murdered. Those who have been accused of more serious crimes are kept in a different pod than those accused of lesser offenses.

Watson says to keep situations from escalating, his staff must stay on top of any behavior that is out of line. Each staff member makes notes on each child’s behavior. Graffiti is removed immediately, especially if it looks gang-related. Disagreements with other residents are noted and monitored, and the hall’s staff takes a heightened interest if a child has gotten bad news about his family or his case.

“We don’t carry mace, but we do have a response team,” Watson said.

He said he worries when he sees that some of the children have no remorse, even for severe criminal acts. And he’s saddened by some of their life stories and the experiences that have led them to commit criminal acts.

Despite Watson’s encouragement and the hall’s training to reduce anger and criminal habits, he said he may see as many as 40 percent of them return as repeat offenders.

On the other hand, the pods are quiet. “It’s not like ‘Bad Boys,’” he said, referring to the 1983 Sean Penn movie about a rough Chicago juvenile detention center. He said some youths begin to see Solano’s juvenile hall as a safe place to be.

One youth last week who had spoken inappropriately to another was being counseled at a common room table and encouraged to reflect on making better choices. The conversation was low-volume and calm.

A few of the youths joked good-naturedly with Watson, and he joked back. Few wore sullen expressions the day the superintendent was interviewed. One girl who participated in a program that lets children experience parenthood using lifelike baby dolls asked Watson a question about child care.

“We try to treat them the way we would want our own children to be treated,” he said. “When you talk to them one on one, you find out they’re still kids.”