TRI In The News

McKenzie: Books Behind Bars Back in Business

December 19, 2011

From The Daily Progress

Now is the summer of sinus discontent and bronchial spasms made glorious winter by clean air and central heat.

Books Behind Bars, a local nonprofit organization that provides books free to inmates in Virginia’s jails and prisons, is in new digs, resolving a months-long effort to replace a large but climatically challenged facility.

“It’s a wonderful place,” said Kay Allison, of Books Behind Bars. “We have heat and it’s a very nice space. We’re grateful and happy for it.”

Books Behind Bars is a different sort of charity. It started in the spare room of the Quest Bookstore, run by Ms. Allison, on West Main Street. The idea was to get dictionaries into the hands of state inmates, as there was a dearth of them and prisoners were not allowed to check them out of the libraries.

The effort has received support from the Dave Matthews Band through its community charitable efforts, Verizon Telecom Pioneers and Alpha Pi Omega, a co-ed service fraternity at the University of Virginia.

Receiving a dictionary from Books Behind Bars put the words in the cells. It worked so well and the books were so well received that the organization soon expanded to provide other types of books. As more books were sent to more prisoners at more prisons, more volunteers came on board and more fundraisers were held.

As word got around, inmates began asking for more than dictionaries. They sought books on business, self-help and cooking. Many ask for books by African-American authors.

“The majority of the requests we get are for dictionaries and that’s the majority of the books we ship out,” Ms. Allison said, noting that religious books and fiction are high on the list, as well. “A lot of the requests are for collegiate dictionaries because they want more words.”

Not long ago, the program’s popularity ran afoul of officials in the Virginia Department of Corrections, leading to tighter restrictions on the program that amounted to a near ban on the books. With support from the Albemarle County-based Rutherford Institute, the organization and its books were allowed back in.

But finding a spot to sort, store and ship the books on this side of the fence has been a moving target. In the past decade or so, Books Behind Bars has been headquartered in spare rooms and moved by sales and it recently sought succor from the heat, cold and a dusting of mold. Organizers began looking for a new space in July.

“It was really great to have the space offered and we took it up quickly,” Ms. Allison said of their previous home in a local garage-like storage space. “We had to move pretty quickly and a local company was kind enough to donate the space, but we didn’t take into consideration that it would be so difficult to work in because, in the winter, it’s unbearably cold and, in the summer, it’s unbearably hot.”

The old location also had a humidity issue that caused a light layer of mold to form in places like floors, walls, ceiling and books.

Volunteers found themselves afflicted by the building’s conditions and Ms. Allison said many gave up the effort. The new Harris Street location, with rent paid by a donor, is large enough to meet the charitable needs for storage and shipping space and provides a much better environment.

With the new location and a $5,000 grant from the Dave Matthews Band-funded BAMA Works of the Charlottesville Area Community Foundation, they’re ready to box the books and get them into cells.

“We’re in the process of unpacking hundreds of boxes of books and that’s a bit hard to do right now because students are on vacation,” Ms. Allison said. “We continue to get about 500 requests a month and they’re all backed up now. We’ve filled very few requests in the last few months. We hope to change that.”