The Legislature’s Appropriations Committee gets to hear from the Department of Corrections on Wednesday on what it’s doing to fill its growing empty positions. According to slides prepared for the 9 a.m. meeting, the number of vacant positions in the Department of Corrections has more than doubled since March:
The Governor only started whacking honchos in the Department of Corrections in the middle of July, and news about pay increases didn’t come out until July 30. We thus shouldn’t read the continued loss of staff through the end of July as a sign that DOC’s reforms aren’t stopping staff loss. Heck, for all we know, the ten additional open positions could all be people who either got axed by the Governor or who bailed because they knew they would be next on any gubernatorial hit list.
The DOC slides give details on the pay policy changes approved by the Governor a couple weeks ago. DOC is raising night shift pay by $1.50 an hour, doubling pay for employees who work double time to cover empty shifts, and offering retention bonuses of up to $2,500 spread out over four payments at the beginning of October, December, February, and April. Corrections says the total cost of these raises will be $3.1 million: $1.8M for the retention bonuses for 701 existing staff and 121 new hires, $970K for double time shift coverage, and $265K for the night shift boost.
Corrections also notes that CGL Companies of California won its $166,410 contract to review South Dakota’s prison facilities and operations without going through an open competitive bidding process. Corrections justifies the exemption from the normal request-for-proposals procedure under SDCL 5-18D-21(1), which the state need not issue open RFPs when the services it seeks are “of such a unique nature that the contractor selected is clearly and justifiably the only practicable source to provide the service.” So evidently the only people qualified to review South Dakota’s prison operations, organizational structure, training, etc. are experts from Communist California. Hmmm… for a failed socialist state, California sure does produce a lot of experts. Maybe our appropriators should ask the DOC officials Wednesday just how many places they looked for prison consultants and whether they really couldn’t find any other vendors who might submit a bid for such an important job.
Well..there is no one in South Dakota with this expertise??? If not, it would behoove us to invest some money to develop this expertise locally. These problems will continue.
Somehow, from the start Noem’s reactions to this “anonymous” letter have raised suspicions in this reader’s mind. Thousands of people sign petitions each year hoping to change direction of our state government to better it-only to be ignored or worse yet having their votes challenged in court because certain government official deem the vote wrong in their opinion. Daugard got Initiative # 22 changed/watered down (removed ethic provisions etc) that people wanted in government. Now Noem reacts as she has to one letter of complaint and firs people right and left and puts the dept in turmoil. If her reactions rectify a wrong she’s doing right-if something else, she seems to be absent so much from her job by chasing rainbows of national glory.
Good point, Jake. Whatever problems may exist in South Dakota’s prisons, no one has yet come out and attested to them by name. Governor Noem has not issued any formal report of findings. The pay problem is obvious, but pay isn’t something you fire managers over (unless we want to fire the real “managers” who are responsible for the low pay and benefits, and that would be the Legislature and the Governor).
Cory…its no mystery that we are faced periodically with a prison crises…we’ve managed them for years with the same care and pride as your neighborhood junk yard is managed. Prison is where we haul away the car wrecks and tragic accidents of our society and forget them. Out of sight, out of mind.