MTAV Podcast 7: Bill Brown and Tierney Lawson Of The Prison Yoga Project

The United States has the largest prison population in the world and the highest per-capita incarceration rate. According to the Public Policy Institute Of California, since 2017, California’s institutional prison population has hovered at about 115,000 inmates—just below the Supreme Court-mandated target of 137.5% of design capacity—the number of prisoners the system was built to house (not counting inmates housed in camps or contract facilities). 13 of the 35 state-owned facilities individually operate beyond that capacity. A majority of these inmates will return back to society with rehabilitation in the system not being a priority. This is where the Prison Yoga Project is trying to bridge the gap. Their mission is simple as stated on their website:

Prison Yoga Project supports incarcerated people with trauma-informed yoga and mindfulness practices to promote rehabilitation, reduce recidivism, and improve public safety.

To learn more about this mission I invited Bill Brown, Executive Director and Tierney Lawson, Training and Professional Development Manager at The Prison Yoga Project to sit down and talk about their experience, mission, and thoughts on teaching Yoga inside of California Department Of Correction facilities. You can listen to the conversation below. ( Also available on iTunes.)

Bill Brown and Tierney Lawson from the Prison Yoga Project