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Justice calls second state of emergency for correctional facility staffing

CHARLESTON — For the second time since taking office in 2017, Gov. Jim Justice declared a state of emergency for West Virginia’s prisons and regional jails, citing severe staffing shortages and laying the blame at the feet of lawmakers.

“Our jails are in a state of emergency at this point in time,” Justice said during a virtual briefing with reporters Thursday at the State Capitol Building. “Today, I am issuing a state of emergency to address critical staffing issues or shortages with our correctional facilities across West Virginia.”

Justice issued a proclamation for a state of emergency Thursday, ordering the West Virginia National Guard to assist with staffing needs across the state’s 11 prisons, 10 regional jails, 10 juvenile centers, and three work-release sites. The agreement between the National Guard and the Department of Homeland Security can last no more than one year, though it could be extended if staffing shortages continue.

“The state of emergency that we’re putting into effect today will enable us … to move the National Guard to bridge us through this emergency period until we can get folks hired,” Justice said. “Our National Guard, who have come to the rescue and saved us over and over, will step up and be able to help us staff these facilities until we get the people hired.”

According to the state Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation (DCR), there are 2,862 people employed in West Virginia’s regional jails, correctional centers, community corrections, juvenile services, and non-facility staff — down 2.9% since the beginning of 2022 and down 7.1% since this same time last year. Staffing numbers have dropped more than 36% since August 2020.

This is the second time that Justice has declared a state of emergency for prison staffing shortages. In December 2017, he issued the declaration empowering DHS Cabinet Secretary Jeff Sandy to pull staff temporarily from other agencies and employ the use of the National Guard. That state of emergency ended in August 2018. More than 106 National Guard members provided staffing assistance in 18 facilities during that state of emergency.

According to a 2019 report by the U.S. Bureau for Labor Statistics, West Virginia’s correctional officer annual mean wage was $38,740. Of West Virginia’s surrounding states, only Kentucky had a lower annual mean wage. Since then, there have been three 5% pay raises for state employees, including DHS staff, along with a specific pay increase aimed at correctional officers.

Still, efforts have been made to try and address correctional officer and DCR pay along border counties with states that pay their correctional officers and staff more. Earlier this year, a bill was originated out of the House Finance Committee by Del. Jason Barrett, R-Berkeley, to create a locality pay program for correctional officers.

“During the last legislative period and everything, we had a bipartisan group that we tried to get through to do a regional pay differential to folks in certain areas, like the Eastern Panhandle, where the shortages are off the chart — 60% maybe,” Justice said. “Absolutely, we just haven’t been able to compete and attract folks and everything into these positions.”

The bill was recommended for passage by the House Finance Committee and made it to second reading and amendment stage in the House before being parked on the House’s inactive calendar more than a week before the end of the regular legislative session.

“I hate like crazy that the bill stalled in the Legislature,” Justice said. “We didn’t get it through last time. Maybe we’ll get it through this time coming up. Nevertheless, this is really important that we do this right now or we’ll end up with a bad situation that could end up really bad.”

An attempt by Barrett to amend a locality pay provision in a bill that passed during the legislative session to include West Virginia State Police troopers in the 5% state employee raise also failed. Barrett cited issues with Eastern Panhandle counties losing state employees to neighboring Virginia and Maryland.

“Locality pay is not some farfetched concept that those of us who represent at the Eastern panhandle have concocted,” Barrett said in March. “We have an immediate crisis in the Eastern Panhandle with retaining state troopers, corrections, workers, educators, (Child Protective Services) workers, and the list goes on and on.”

Steven Allen Adams can be reached at sadams@newsandsentinel.com

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