Alabama top stories in brief

• Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo, the director of the UAB Division of Infectious Diseases, has been named as the new director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, a role previously held by Dr. Anthony Fauci. According to UAB, Marrazzo will start her term in the fall. 

• The Netflix film, “They Cloned Tyrone,” and its director Juel Taylor, who was born and raised in Tuskegee, Alabama, were praised on X, formerly known as Twitter, by Oscar award winning director Barry Jenkins, who directed “Moonlight.” Jenkins tweeted that the film deserved to be nominated for the Directors Guild of America’s Award for Outstanding Directing of a First-Time Feature Film.

• Alabama and federal agencies are partnering to make improvements to Alabama’s section of the Pinhoti trail. The Alabama Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, the Alabama Forestry Commission and the USDA Forest Service will be forming a governance board to provide collaboration in trail restoration, development and maintenance.

• The city of Birmingham announced that Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson will be a keynote speaker for the 2023 Forging Justice Commemoration Week, which will be held in remembrance of the 60th anniversary of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing. The event will take place from September 10-16. 

• The head of the Alabama Medical Cannabis Commission, Dr. Steven Stokes, resigned from his position last Wednesday, August 2. Stokes’s resignation comes after a lawsuit was filed against him that claimed his original appointment was illegal because he was appointed while serving as a board member for the University of South Alabama. Stokes had originally said he’d fight the lawsuit but said after his resignation that he’d chosen to avoid delaying the commission’s work further with litigation. 

• Sen. Tim Melson, R-Florence, who suffered a cardiac event while visiting South Korea, will be returning back home to Alabama soon. According to Melson’s family, his recovery has gone well; on August 2, they announced that he had been removed from the ventilator and was alert and talking with them. They continue to provide updates via Facebook to all those concerned for the Senator’s health. 

Summer heat brings concerns for safety in ADOC facilities

According to an article published by the Alabama Reflector on August 3, as temperatures rise for the summer, conditions in Alabama Department of Correction Facilities deteriorate. 

As the Reflector notes, there are currently no ADOC facilities with integrated central air conditioning units. All of their facilities do have air conditioning somewhere within the facility, though, according to the Reflector, these are generally the health wings of facilities and areas where officers congregate. 

ADOC has said that large industrial fans are used in areas where air conditioning is not provided, and that new correctional facilities will meet the standards for climate control described by the American Corrections Association. 

According to the American Corrections Association’s directory, none of the facilities run by ADOC are currently accredited with them. 

Ashley Light, a senior staff attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center, who toured the prisons, told the Reflector that the conditions were miserable. 

“Especially in some of the larger dorms, the air gets very thick,” Light said. “Some of the larger dorms can have between 100-150 people in the dorm, on bunk beds. Not a whole lot of space to move around, not a lot of air movement through the building.”

For activists, the concern over heat goes beyond the physical safety of the inmates. The Reflector’s article references both formerly incarcerated individuals and advocates like Light, who say that heat increases mental health issues in the prison. 

Research has shown that there is a link between extreme heat and mental health issues, which can include upticks in violence, depression, anxiety and suicide. 

Our articles you might have missed

• Last week’s Roundup focused on Gov. Kay Ivey’s recent call for higher participation in Alabama’s workforce. Currently, although Alabama has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, it also has a low workforce participation. 

Check out the latest issue of The Alabama Ramble by Wesley Miller! This ramble featured a tour of downtown Wetumpka, Alabama, and included some great food, delicious coffee and amazing art.