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By Mike Ward
Austin American-Statesman
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Big raises sought for prison workers
Texas budget proposal calls for 20 percent average increase.
Texas prison guards and state parole officers would get big pay raises under a two-year budget proposal unveiled Wednesday by prison officials, the largest such increases in decades.
Cost: about $453 million for the raises, which average 20 percent.
Next stop for the package, expected to be formally approved today by the Texas Board of Criminal Justice, is the Legislature, which convenes in January with a growing list of big-ticket needs and which will have a final say on any raises.
Even so, news of the proposal drew cheers from employees throughout Texas' 106-prison system, where correctional officers for years have been working short-staffed and for pay that ranks near the lowest in the country. There are about 24,700 correctional officers and 1,400 parole officers in Texas.
"We love it," said Brian Olsen, who heads a prison employee organization of correctional employees. "It's very aggressive, the largest pay raise ever recommended in the history of the agency. It's about time."
Brad Livingston, the prison system's executive director, said the proposal would raise starting pay for correctional officers from $26,016 to $30,179 and the maximum salaries from $34,624 to $42,242.
Livingston said the increase would cover staff from correctional officers through wardens.
For parole officers, starting pay would increase from $32,277 to $37,441, and the maximum salary would go from $36,363 to $43,636.
Saying the proposal "will fundamentally address the officer career ladder for the long haul," Livingston said the goal is to continue to reduce the agency's critically high vacancy rate and "reward our employees for their dedication to providing public safety."
Texas prisons have been short of guards for several years, so short that officials within the past year have had to close parts of some prisons. Without proper staffing, convicts have to be kept confined to their cells more than they should be, programs have to be suspended, and conditions inside prisons generally become more undesirable — for guards and convicts.
The shortage of correctional officers reached a crisis point 11 months ago, when the agency had 3,978 vacancies. Livingston said that through July, the shortage had been reduced to 3,040, thanks to a beefed-up recruitment program and incentive pay.
Board Chairman Oliver Bell predicted that the pay increase will help reduce the vacancy rate even more. It will help "retain our current staff, recruit new officers and overall would send a positive message to our employees that we value their dedication to protecting the safety of the citizens of Texas."
Although legislative leaders greeted the proposal warmly, they said it will have to be considered with all the other demands that will face state budget writers come January.
Even so, the employee group's Olsen said, it would be tough not to OK the raises.
"I don't see where the Legislature cannot approve the raises," Olsen said. "Correctional officers are so far behind; this should have been done years ago."
Livingston, in a statement attached to the proposed budget, agreed: "We recognize the state's leadership will be required to make many difficult funding decisions during the upcoming legislative session, however, we strongly support a pay raise."
In addition to the raises, the agency's $6.6 billion, two-year legislative appropriation request also includes an additional $181.1 million for convict health care, $30 million to buy additional video surveillance and contraband screening gear and metal detectors to beef up security, $22 million to make a former Veterans Affairs hospital in Marlin usable for convict health care and more than $10 million to expand treatment programs.
The proposal includes no money for new prisons.