Mark W. Michael Unit

A high-security Tennessee Colony prison with 22 hospice beds in its infirmary — sharing a farm road, and a near-identical address, with the Coffield Unit.

Overview

The Mark W. Michael Unit opened in September 1987 in the Tennessee Colony cluster, where it shares roughly 20,528 rural acres with Coffield, Beto, Powledge, and the Gurney Transfer Facility. It houses the full custody range — G1 through G5, security detention, and safekeeping — with a listed capacity of 3,305.

The addresses invite confusion: Michael sits at 2664 FM 2054 and Coffield at 2661 FM 2054 — near-identical numbers on the same farm road. The two are different prisons with different visiting lists; the inmate locator shows which one a person is in, and that determines the gate.

What Makes Mark W. Michael Unit Different

• Its infirmary is heavily oriented to hospice care: 22 of its 24 beds are hospice beds, with 24/7 medical care managed by UTMB and all services on a single level.
• It is one of only 13 TDCJ units where remote video visits are scheduled through the Securus website rather than the TDCJ portal — which is why the portal shows no video hours for Michael — relevant for families far from Anderson County.
• The custody mix spans minimum through close custody plus security detention and safekeeping, so the visiting format follows the incarcerated person’s classification — two families arriving the same morning may have very different visits.
• Trinity Valley Community College teaches five vocational programs on site, alongside Windham trade courses.
• A faith-based dormitory and the GO KIDS initiative are among its listed programs.

Visiting Hours and Procedures

The statewide rules above — approval, ID, prohibited items, and dress code — apply at Michael. What follows is specific to this unit.

With about 3,305 beds and restrictive-custody populations, movement from housing to the visiting area can add waiting time, and non-contact procedures apply to restrictive statuses on the same posted schedule. Because the unit houses men in hospice and infirmary care, treatment status can affect availability for a visit on a given day. Account setup and phone rates are covered in Phone & Video Calls.

Getting There and Parking

Michael is on FM 2054 in rural Anderson County, reached on farm-to-market roads from the Palestine area.

TDCJ does not publish visitor parking details for the unit. There is no fixed-route bus to the unit. GoBus, the transit program of the East Texas Council of Governments, runs shared-ride, advance-reservation service across Anderson County on weekdays only — not on the weekend visiting days — so the trip is by car.

Nearby Services

Tennessee Colony is small, with limited commercial services; Palestine is the service hub for gas, food, groceries, and lodging. Hotel sites list chain properties in Palestine, including Hampton Inn & Suites and Holiday Inn Express. Palestine Regional Medical Center on South Loop 256 operates a 24-hour emergency room, and a CHRISTUS emergency room also operates in Palestine.

For support beyond the unit itself, the Texas Incarcerated Families Association (TIFA) is a statewide nonprofit focused on education, advocacy, and prison-system navigation for families; its helpline is (512) 371-0900.

Learn More

For detailed information about visiting and communicating with someone at a Texas state prison:

• Visiting in Texas — TDCJ approval process, dress code, scheduling
• Medical & Mental Health — healthcare in TDCJ facilities
• Mail & Packages — what you can send and what gets rejected
• Phone & Video Calls — Securus accounts, call costs, video visits
• Sending Money — how to add funds to a TDCJ trust account
• Transfers — what happens during transfers