The Vermont Department of Corrections on Monday instituted an “emergency” staffing change at Southern State Correctional Facility in Springfield, switching from five 8-hour shifts a week — sometimes with mandatory overtime — to five 12-hour shifts.
“This change was implemented to address staffing shortages at the facility and to stabilize the facility schedule as summer begins,” Corrections Commissioner Nicholas Deml said in a written statement.
Steve Howard, who represents corrections staff as executive director of the Vermont State Employees’ Association, called the decision “cruel and inhumane.”
“These men and women are human beings, and they haven’t seen their spouse, they haven’t seen their children,” Howard said.
The Department of Corrections did not disclose the exact extent of Springfield’s staffing issues. Spokesperson Rachel Feldman said that there’s a 20-25% vacancy rate among security staff across the department and stressed that current staff are working to keep every facility safe. The department monitors staffing levels on a daily basis to ensure thorough coverage, she said.
In March, Deml told the House Committee on Corrections and Institutions that a “vast majority” of staff at the Northeast Correctional Complex in St. Johnsbury had petitioned to permanently adopt 12-hour shifts rather than eight-hour shifts.
According to Deml, that change led to “consistent and reliable schedules for staff, a reduction in forced overtime, and the return of formerly employed staff rejoining the Corrections’ team.”
He added that Corrections is working with “labor partners” to minimize mandatory overtime and stabilize staffing through new efforts the department hopes to implement later this summer.
But Howard sees the change in Springfield as one more red flag in a worsening staffing crisis in the department.
Understaffed correctional facilities pose risks for staff and residents alike, he said. Incarcerated people rely on staff to keep them safe, Howard said, while fewer and increasingly tired workers threaten their wellbeing.
With corrections staff working 12- and sometimes 16-hour days, Howard said he has heard from some employees who have fallen asleep at the wheel.
“You can only ask a human being to do so much before they break,” he said.
Vermont’s budget surplus is a source of funding that could help solve some of Corrections’s staffing woes, Howard suggested. But both the governor and legislators have appeared unwilling, he said.
“I think the public needs to know that the corrections system is crumbling because (politicians) will not make the kind of investments that need to be made to stabilize the system.”
Howard pointed to Nebraska, where an $8-per-hour wage increase — plus a $15,000 hiring bonus — boosted entry-level Department of Corrections applications by over 300%, as an example of a similar problem solved with more money.
Rep. Alice Emmons, D-Springfield, who serves as chair of the House Committee on Corrections and Institutions, said that the staffing shortage in Corrections has been an ongoing topic of discussion.
“When the unemployment rate is very low, people don’t go into law enforcement or corrections,” she said. “Here in Springfield, this facility, even when it opened, was not fully staffed. So that’s been exacerbated through this pandemic.”
Southern State opened in Springfield in 2003.
As a result of the correctional officer shortage, “field” workers, who oversee people after they’re released from prison, are being forced to pick up shifts inside Southern State, Howard said. He fears that such stopgap solutions could have public safety implications.
“My fear is that politicians won’t act until something very bad happens: they lose control of a prison, or they lose control of a unit, or somebody gets killed,” Howard said. “We have got to get the public’s help in convincing these politicians to stop playing these games.”