'Milwaukee 53206' Shows the Full Cost of Mass Incarceration

I wake up many mornings missing Milwaukee. I miss the streets, the food, the proximity to Lake Michigan, the prevalent bike lanes, and my college days there. 

Although I know Milwaukee well, I did not know 53206 — the most incarcerated zip code in the country, according to the documentary of that name. Sixty-two percent of the men living in 53206 have spent time in a correctional facility. And for anyone who knows Milwaukee, who knows this city oscillates between the most and the second most segregated city in the country, residents of 53206 are predominantly black. In many ways, Milwaukee 53206 could be the poster neighborhood for Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.

But regurgitating the troubling statistics of incarceration is not what the film was trying to do. Instead, it tries to tell the stories behind the statistics, to show the faces which make up the numbers — and thankfully not just the male faces. According to the film’s creators — who plan to take the film to festivals and community screenings in 2017 — Milwaukee 53206 was made so that an American audience could “witness the high toll mass incarceration takes on individuals and families that make-up the community.”

And as the tag line states, this is a community serving time. When we only talk about the issues facing black men in society, we miss the people who are left behind — namely, black women: wives, and mothers, and their children who grow up without a father.

What happened to Diamond Reynolds, the girlfriend of Philando Castile, after watching her boyfriend get shot in his own car by a police officer? What happened to Keith Lamont Scott’s son who he was waiting for when he was shot and killed? The missing black men in our society need to be mourned, and the voices of the remaining black women and children need to be heard as well.

Yet director/producer Keith McQuirter, who previously produced the five-part docuseries Brick City for the Sundance Channel, seems determined not to tell Milwaukee’s story of hyper-segregation or Wisconsin’s racist judiciary system so much as to tell America’s mass incarceration story. For me, as a former resident and die-hard Milwaukee fan, the distance at which the film creators held the city itself took away from the complexity of the film. Milwaukee 53206 could have demanded action in this very real neighborhood of Milwaukee, but it didn’t.

But the stories it did tell are valuable. The first story is Dennis Walton, the hard-hitting spiritual guide to incarcerated men and co-director of the Milwaukee Fatherhood Initiative with Milwaukee mayor Tom Barrett. Dennis is a relatable mentor and friend to inmates, helping them explore their past experiences.

If Dennis is the inspiration, Chad Wilson is the hope. Chad grew up in 53206, went through Dennis’ course while incarcerated, and was rewarded with a position at the Milwaukee Fatherhood Initiative after his release. He is becoming a person his community needs.

But the true star of this show is Beverly Walker, a hidden victim of the plague of incarceration. Beverly is the wife of Baron Walker, a man who has been in prison for 21 years and who is currently being expected to serve a full sentence without parole due to Wisconsin’s 1998 truth-in-sentencing bill. Beverly has no choice but to keep her five children and their live running without her husband.Despite all her perseverance and hard work, whenever she feels happiness, Beverly can’t help but feel guilty and hollow, knowing she can’t share her joy with the one person she longs for.

And here lies the implicit importance of this documentary. Through no fault of her own, Beverly is sentenced to a crushing load. From making all the decisions for her family on her own, to taking on the role of single parent, Beverly is required to be unfairly strong. All she and her family can do is continue living — acting out their own resistance of thriving when all pressures are on them to give up.

With this, Milwaukee 53206 is a case study for the broad issue of mass incarceration. It gives the ability to recognize the ailing part of this body of humanity as a part of ourselves and to grapple with the effects and the responsibility of 1 Corinthians 12:26: “If one part suffers, every part suffers with it.”