Chastyn “Nova” Hicks

How do you budget on a couple hundred dollars or less a month of income? That’s a question most people in prison have to ask themselves. The vast majority of prison jobs pay an hourly wage of cents on the dollar — and several states pay nothing. Tight budgets are a fact of life in prison. Learning to stretch earnings and finding other ways to pad your income, via side hustles and family support, are an important part of surviving behind bars.

At the start of the summer, the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry announced in an e-message that all smoking would be prohibited in state prisons. Keefe Commissary Network would no longer allow prisoners to purchase rolling tobacco and smoking-related products. It was a once-in-a-prison-lifetime opportunity. Typically, I earn $70 per month from my job as a peer facilitator.

For nearly two decades, Trinity Food Services served meals to state prisoners in Arizona. Then on Sept. 30, 2024, another company named Aramark replaced Trinity. In my experience, Trinity provided consistent meals, but the food was often mediocre, tasteless and unsatisfying. Five months after Aramark was established as the vendor, I surveyed 100 incarcerated people on the change. About 65% of respondents considered Aramark the better food service vendor.