By JAMES MERRIWEATHER
Dover Bureau reporter
02/13/2002

A shortage of correctional officers is keeping state prison officials from phasing in use of 400 new beds at the Delaware Correctional Institution near Smyrna, officials said Tuesday.

"As we hire those people, our intent is to open those units," Correction Commissioner Stanley W. Taylor Jr. told the legislative Joint Finance Committee in Dover.

But Taylor said he was not confident he would be able to hire the 40 officers needed before the current fiscal year ends June 30.

The prison system on Monday was about 130 inmates short of its operational capacity of about 6,580.

The state's prison population has been climbing gradually since July 1.

Taylor talked about the shortage of correctional officers while proposing an operating budget of more than $183.8 million for the fiscal year that begins July 1, an increase of 1.73 percent.

The Joint Finance Committee in June will write the state's operating budget for fiscal 2003, using an outline submitted by Minner and information from hearings that are being held.

The big-ticket correction request is for slightly more than $2.44 million to fill 96 positions that are authorized - but unfunded because of budget cutbacks. That includes 59 correctional officers.

All told, 62 security positions - not counting the unfunded positions and those reserved for 59 cadets now in training - were vacant as of Jan. 31.

According to Taylor, only 455 of 613 officers hired since May 4, 2000 still are on the job. That's an attrition rate of 26 percent over 21 months, compared with an annual turnover rate of 7 percent among all correctional officers.

The officers were hired to accommodate a 2,500-bed, $180.5 million expansion program completed in late 2000, including a total of 900 new beds at Delaware Correctional Institution.

Taylor said that successful recruiting efforts over the last 18 months or so had all but flamed out. He attributed the success to job fairs that helped collapse the hiring process from six months or longer to two weeks in some cases.

Paul Howard, chief of the prisons bureau, said the vacancies - particularly those at Wilmington's Gander Hill prison, which is chronically overcrowded - were largely responsible for about $5 million in overtime costs run up during the current fiscal year.

Sen. James T. Vaughn Sr., D-Clayton, committee co-chairman, questioned the overtime tab.

Donald Reiman, director of the Delaware Correctional Officers Association, said low salaries and onerous working conditions - particularly involuntary overtime from unfilled positions - were sore points with officers.

The starting salary for a basic correctional officer is $23,833. Citing revenue shortfalls, Minner has proposed that state employees receive no pay raises next fiscal year.

"Morale is low, and these officers are frustrated," Reiman said.

Reach James Merriweather at 678-4273 or jmerriweather@delawareonline.com.