Overtime at the Delaware Department of Correction is projected to surpass $30 million this budget year – a 37.7 percent jump over the $22.2 million paid out in extra time last fiscal year.
The conditions that led to last year's deadly prison riot were blamed, in part, on severe understaffing, forcing administrators to ask – and even mandate – overtime shifts. Yet, despite DOC efforts to curb overtime, massive resignations since the riot have forced the use of more overtime.
Because of that, many say tensions inside the state's prisons are escalating again.
The projection, based on more than $15 million in overtime already paid in the first half of this budget year, flies in the face of recommendations made in an independent review following the deadly February 2017 riot at James T. Vaughn Correctional Center near Smyrna.
That report urged the state DOC to reduce its dependency on overtime, particularly forced overtime – the practice of making guards stay for an extra shift. That practice, the report said, chipped away at security and behavior so much that "the unacceptable becomes acceptable."
But despite the urging of the review team and promises from state lawmakers to curb mandatory overtime, the problem is getting worse.
DOC officials concede there is no quick fix to the forced overtime practice, also known as "freezing."
Taxpayers can expect to continue footing huge overtime costs in a department that has more than 260 vacancies. That means its staffing level is at 84 percent to supervise about 7,000 inmates, including thieves, rapists and killers.
"It's not something that's going to solve overnight because of that many vacancies," said Sen. Bruce Ennis, who chairs the Senate Corrections & Public Safety Committee and sits on the Finance Committee. "It's a problem."
The DOC's extra-time pay last fiscal year accounted for nearly 41 percent of the state's total overtime budget of more than $54 million.
Ennis, a Democrat from Smyrna, said it's not easy filling those jobs. He said there are unemployed people not willing to become correctional officers despite recently announced incentives and increased pay.
"They just don't want to be in that environment."
On Tuesday, the DOC announced a new recruitment and referral incentive program. New cadets can earn $3,000 in bonuses – half can be collected upon graduation, half to be paid 18 months from the initial date of employment. There is also a $1,000 incentive to existing employees who refer successful candidates.
The department has also hired two full-time recruiters, whose primary responsibility is to attend career fairs regionally to recruit and attract qualified officers. In addition, starting July 1, the starting salary has been increased to $43,000.
Although the DOC has hired hundreds of people since last year's deadly incident, it has not been enough to keep pace with the number of people leaving the department. Of the 223 people hired since Feb. 1, 2017, 48 have been terminated. The department also has seen 275 correction officers leave during that time.
"They want to talk about them putting these cameras up and they're doing this and doing that, but none of that means a hill of beans until you get enough officers," said Geoff Klopp, president of the Correctional Officers Association of Delaware. Klopp said the department needs better pay and a better compensation plan to attract and retain people.
"You have to have a pay scale like other law enforcement agencies have that show what you will be making as you progress through your career," he said.
Gov. John Carney's proposed budget for the coming fiscal would increase the DOC budget by 6.6 percent to $329 million – a bump of about $20 million.
Most of that increase – $14.7 million – would go toward funding officer raises promised in a new labor deal their union struck with the state last summer along with pay increases associated with promotions. Those enhancements would bring the starting pay for correctional officers up from $3,000 to $43,000.
New funding and cost reductions elsewhere in the department would allow for the creation of 28 additional positions at the Baylor Women's Correctional Institution and fund several of the recommendations offered by the independent review team.
Those funded recommendations would include $132,000 for a stress management program, pre-employment psychological testing and expanded drug testing for officers; $375,000 for a pilot cognitive behavioral therapy program for about 300 inmates; and $225,000 for the Wilmington HOPE Commission, a nonprofit that seeks to keep ex-inmates from re-offending.
Klopp sees correctional officers enduring 12 to 18 more months of this until he thinks conditions for his officers will start to change. Until then, the DOC will continue freezing shifts, which he said is leaving correctional officers physically and mentally exhausted.
He estimates that between 50 and 100 correctional officers are forced to work overtime on any given day at the state's four prisons. According to a report issued by the state Auditor's Office last May, about 75 percent of the DOC's workforce received overtime.
Three factors have contributed to the jump in overtime this year:
- The DOC reinstituted security teams at Vaughn, who gathered intelligence on possible illegal activities and conduct prison cell inspections.
- Increased activation of the DOC's Correctional Emergency Response Team, which is responsible for moving inmates from different prison facilities and hospitals.
- Implementation of recommendations by the independent review team. For example, when new cameras were being installed in buildings housing inmates, CERT members organized and monitored the movement of prisoners to other buildings at Vaughn. Correction officers also had to supervise people installing the cameras because installers could not be permitted unsupervised on the grounds.
"People are fatigued and in need of relief from the excessive amounts of overtime that we are having to work to try to run these facilities," Klopp said.
With warmer months approaching, he expects freezing shifts to worsen as corrections officers take time off to do more outdoor activities or be with family.
There are positives to using more overtime, said Jim Butkiewicz, chair of the economics department at the University of Delaware. Companies pay less in vacation and time off, health insurance premiums and retirement contributions.
"Although in the long run the level of stress probably is not a good idea to rely on overtime," Butkiewicz said, adding that the DOC's current situation appears to be borne more out of necessity than policy.
Butkiewicz pointed out that states across the country are seeing overcrowded, understaffed prisons.
In December, West Virginia's governor declared a state of emergency allowing the use of the National Guard at overcrowded and understaffed state correctional facilities.
Hundreds of secretaries, teachers, counselors, cooks and medical staffers were tapped last year to fill guard posts across the U.S. Bureau of Prisons because of acute officer shortages and overtime limits, according to prison records reviewed by USA Today and staff interviews.
In some instances correctional officers leave their jobs, seeking better-paying jobs in other prisons or law enforcement agencies, Butkiewicz said.
"The classic way to hire more people is to offer a better compensation package," Butkiewicz said. "Other than that I don't know."
The long-run answer is to find ways to reduce crime so that there is not such a large crime population, he said.
"If we would reduce those things, we would have a smaller prison population and perhaps wouldn't need as many guards," Butkiewicz said. "But those things don't happen overnight. Those are very long-run challenges."