This article describes a program at a prison in California, USA that allows incarcerated mothers to live with their young children in a nursery in the prison. The program, called “Prototypes,” is the only Community Prisoner Mother Program (CPMP) left in California. According to the article, “the US is one of four countries to allow the separation of newborn babies from their incarcerated mothers, usually within 24 or 48 hours of birth. The others are the Bahamas, Liberia, and Suriname.” And the issue of mother-child separation due to incarceration has become a more urgent matter as the numbers of women in the US who are incarcerated has risen 646% from 1980 to 2010, and seven out of ten of those women are mothers.
Because there are so few opportunities for infants and young children to remain with their mothers while the mothers are in prison, many children of incarcerated mothers are placed into foster care. The Prototypes program in California prevents the placement of these children into foster care as it allows young children to reside with their mothers in prison. It is the only CPMP in California that has remained open, because, at the threat of closure, the women fought to keep their mother-infant program and won. This article tells their story and presents some of the evidence that supports mother-infant programs for incarcerated mothers, both in terms of the wellbeing of the child as well as the mother. According to the article, several studies indicate that these programs reduce recidivism rates for mothers and reduce anxiety and depression in children.