It's cold and clear. It's a neighborhood that breeds more than its fair share of the people who end up in the thing that these marchers are protesting.
Poverty is the first prison.
He chants in a melodic gospel voice and carries the Pan-African flag to call attention to the racial disparities in prisons. Last week the group came through Fresno, walked from Visalia to Corcoran and south to Delano, where the next state prison expansion is slated to be built. The core group of 15, many from Japan or out of state, is headed to Lompoc on a 32-day pilgrimage. Locals join in for a day or two at a time. It seems pretentious to have a bunch of East Coast Buddhist types walking and praying for us to see the error of our ways when politicians and prison lobbyists say we need to relieve overcrowding and bring economic development and guard jobs to poor Valley towns.