newjerseynewsroom.com

Friday
May 25th

Corrections Dept. minus 20%

The Corrections Department spent $1.1 Billion last fiscal year. That means it can only spend about $900 million this year. How can a Department reduce costs by $200 million in one year? Here is a good start: Riverfront State Prison closed. Around 300 Custody personnel were transferred to the other 13 prisons. All of the other prisons were already staffed at 100% for custody staff. With all of these extra people you would think that overtime costs would be reduced. Wrong! Through incompetent administrative practices none of these transferred personnel were figured into a plan to reduce overtime. They were simply "added" in to the already filled areas. In addition you would think that if one of your 14 prisons closed you would see 1/14 of your costs be reduced. Wrong! Not a single dime has been saved with the closure of Riverfront State prison. The Bloated Central Office Bureaucracy. The Department has 13 prisons. Each is staffed with the normal Human Resource,employee relations, classification,etc. departments. They all have Administrators, Asst. Administrators,Asst. Superintendents etc. But add to this a whole "city" of Bureaucrats located at what is called " Central Office" in Trenton. Hundreds and hundreds of people,some who are important to the smooth functioning of the department but most who if they disappeared would never have an effect on the actual jail operations,make the DOC a very expensive operation. The Department does not need all of the Deputy Commissioners, Asst. Commissioners,Directors,etc. to "run" 13 jails. A study of the 2009 Organizational Chart shows 42 different areas of supervision,and that DOES NOT INCLUDE the bureaucracy in place at the 13 jails. Custody Bureaucracy and overtime . The Federal jail system has two layers of custody supervision. New Jersey has four. There are Chiefs,Captains,Lieutenants,and Sergeants. That should be changed eventually. What should be changed immediately to save millions of dollars in overtime is an archaic employee rule that is in effect no where else in the State. Supervisors in State government either do not get overtime or they get what is known as "comp time " . This compensation time is an hour for hour "pay" in lieu of cash. Work 8 hours overtime and get 8 hours credited for you to take off at another time .This comp time can never be "cashed in " for money. But in Corrections two supervisor groups ,the Lieutenants and Sergeants ,,get cash payments for overtime worked. They are the only supervisors in the State that get this benefit and it is costly. What is even worse is that Lieutenants are allowed to "break back" and work a Sergeants overtime shift! This is such a well kept perk that few if any have ever questioned it.

 

Add your comment

Your name:
Subject:
Comment:
**V 2.0**