Junell walks, talks, listens in Gatesville
By Tim Orwig
GATESVILLE -- State Rep. Rob Junell, one of the key lawmakers who will
decide if Texas correctional officers get a pay raise next year, toured
two prison units here Sept. 26, talking and listening to prison staff.
Junell, D - San Angelo, who chairs the House Appropriations
Committee, walked through the Mountain View and Hughes units at the request
of state Rep. David Lengefeld, D - Hamilton.
Region II Director Lesley Woods and former Texas Comptroller
John Sharp joined the lawmakers on the walk-through.
The units' senior wardens and the regional director made
it clear that overworked and underpaid TDCJ officers are expecting relief
from legislators next year.
"I think we have the leading prison system in the
country," Junell said, "not only in size but in the job we do."
Asked if the next Legislature would increase the pay to
compensate the officers in "the leading system in the country,"
Junell said pay for CO's and other state employees would be a "big
issue" during the next session.
"We're very interested in looking at job classification.
The COIV position was a start. I don't think we are going to see an across-the-board
approach. We need to make some adjustments in job classification."
Stressing that he was only one of many who would decide
the issue, Junell said, "I think we will see something multi-faceted.
If you get a raise, and the insurance goes up, it's a wash."
"Everyone is concerned about the high cost of insurance,"
Lengefeld said.
Junell asked Warden Pam Baggett at Mountain View and Warden
Herbert Scott at Hughes how officers had reacted to the creation of a COIV
position that resulted in a pay raise for some TDCJ workers with 36 months
service.
"Those who received it reacted very well," Warden
Baggett said; the others are still waiting. "But we can see the light
at the end of the tunnel."
Warden Scott told Junell that, while the officers who
got the interim raise were glad to get it, "everybody is anticipating
great things to happen in the Legislature next year."
Woods called the interim raise "a step in the right
direction" to ease the staffing shortage among correctional officers.
"We are not completely out of it," Woods said. "We're waiting
to see what happens. We need to maintain our correctional officers."
Woods said understaffing in Region II is particularly
acute in Anderson County, which has five TDCJ units. The area enjoys a
strong economy with low unemployment. Of the potential officer applicants
available, Woods said, "how many are employable? Many don't have a
high school education; some have a criminal record."
Despite the staffing woes, Woods said, "We have a
lot of good employees who are going to ride this thing out."
Warden Baggett said turnover at Mountain View is heaviest
among new officers, who find that 2nd Shift -- 1:45-10 p.m. -- is hard
on home life or working a second job.
Warden Scott said the increased threat of violence resulting
from understaffing is "the reason people don't want to stay on"
as correctional officers. "Pay, of course, is the other issue."
Pay for COs, as well as other state employees, Junell
said, "will be a big issue" in the next session. But bricks and
bars for new prisons will not be so pressing.
Junell said the state is out of bond money to build prisons,
so if more are needed, Texas voters will have to approve new bonds.
Because low-security, trusty beds cost around $20,000
while high security beds cost $50,000-$60,000, the push would be to increase
the low-security capacity, he said.
He also said the parole release rate has increased with
a "change in the way the parole board looks at cases." More paroles
could ease the need for more prison beds, he said.
But Woods pointed out that the state would face a "Catch
22." With parole rates projected to rise, "you'll be paroling
trusties," he said. That will leave a high-security inmate population
that will not be suited to the cheaper trusty beds.
Texas will continue to use some private prisons, Junell
said, but the state will not consider getting out of the prison business.
"We will continue to use the privates for needed
capacity, which goes in cycles," he said. "But if we needed 10,000
beds, we would not have the privates do that. Some things the privates
can do better, but for the big units, we (the state) would build those
ourselves."
