Working in Florence - Kira Cohen

I figured I should give an update on my field study: Its in the town of Florence, Arizona.

Florence, although I'm still exploring it, is definitively a prison town. It's located about an hour and a half northwest of Tucson, and there are about eleven prisons total within its borders. Some are state facilities, some are private and run by CCA (Corrections Corporation of America), and some are run by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. I'm still learning to keep track of all of them. The ICE facility in Florence is the biggest one in the nation.

In town is also the organization where I'm working, the Florence Immigrant and Refugee Rights Project. The Florence Project provides free legal assistance to detainees and provides free workshops about legal rights. The office is one of the brightest spots in town - full of young, motivated women who stay incredibly positive despite the frustrating nature of their work. I've been helping translate documents that provide evidence to support detainees' claims in court, and doing research on country conditions to show the judges that people would not be safe if they were to be deported.

Even though I'm only at Florence a few months, I'm still struggling with the idea of feeling motivated to do this work long-term. I believe that this struggle will be a theme for me this semester. On the first day of Katie's class, I said this was what I needed to learn: how to see work like this, that seems never-ending, as part of a larger movement. I know that it's all good and necessary, and even though I've only been in Florence for two days, I can see that even though the organization can't single-handedly tackle the entire complex detention system, change is definitely being made every day in the lives of individuals.

But I guess it's this thought I still have that there is a small but relevant difference between between doing good and changing the world. This is not to discount the work that's being done here, the work that I'm doing. I guess it's a broader question. How can you commit yourself to this work day-to-day when the system you're working against just keeps getting stronger, and probably will continue to do so despite all your hard work? Something to think about long term. Many of the people I work with at Florence seem to have a positive spirit, which I've been internalizing more and more. I'm also doing my best to not get desensitized to the things I'm seeing every day. I don't want to normalize the prison industrial comlex, but it IS normal in Florence. Anyway, of course I'm coming up with tons of questions, but I feel really lucky to be doing another piece of learning here, and to know that I am needed and useful in my field study.