Prison Place

Daniel Weintraub: Report says state shouldn't give guards a pay raise

By Daniel Weintraub - dweintraub@sacbee.com
Published 12:00 am PST Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Story appeared in EDITORIALS section, Page B7
Rarely does a government report come along that I recommend people read for themselves. Normally, it's my job to read these things so you don't have to. But a report delivered last week from the state's Legislative Analyst's Office on the labor situation in the prisons is so good, and so important, that I suggest anyone with even a passing interest in state government get on the Internet and take a look.
You can find it at the analyst's Web site www.lao.ca.gov.
But I know that many of you don't have the time or the inclination to plow through a detailed, 20-page report, even one as interesting as this one. And some who might do so would probably like a readers' guide. So I am going to summarize the contents and put them into context here.
In a nutshell, the report describes the increasing cost of the state prison agency, which is the fastest growing major program in the state budget, and traces those costs to the extraordinary salaries, overtime and benefits paid to correctional officers – the people the general public thinks of as "prison guards." California's prisons are costing more than our universities now in part because we are locking more people up for longer terms. But the generous salaries and benefits paid to the correctional officers are also a major reason for the soaring costs.
The report looks at the current pay and benefits and the job market, and concludes that a 5 percent pay raise Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is offering the correctional officers is unnecessary. But the analyst also describes the relationship between the Schwarzenegger administration and the guards' union as "completely dysfunctional," and it says that several managerial changes Schwarzenegger is trying to make in the prisons should go forward.
California's prison system is big and is getting bigger. It is so large that the members of the union that represents correctional officers now account for one of every seven state employees. The salaries and benefits of those employees and their supervisors total 40 percent of all the personnel costs in the state's general fund.
The prisons and the related parole system are staffed by about 30,000 correctional officers and parole agents, and the officers' pay ranges from about $45,000 per year (before overtime, benefits and other perks) to $73,000. The job requires only a high school education.
The guards' union – the California Correctional Peace Officers Association – is at impasse with Schwarzenegger over a new contract. The union's last contract was negotiated by representatives of former Gov. Gray Davis in January 2002, on the eve of Davis' re-election campaign, and approved by the Legislature. It gave the officers a 34 percent raise over five years – more than twice as much as the average salary increase for state employees during the same period. The deal also gave the correctional officers a big increase in pension benefits so that officers can now retire as early as age 50. If they have 30 years on the job, they get 90 percent of their final pay.
The contract also gave the guards a more liberal overtime policy (overtime alone now costs the taxpayers a half billion dollars a year), reduced management control over sick leave and required more negotiations over everyday changes in the operation of the prisons. Schwarzenegger, who, unlike almost everyone else in state politics, has never taken a dime from the correctional officers' union, is trying to keep those provisions out of the next contract.
The union reacted harshly to the report's conclusion that a salary increase was unneeded. Lance Corcoran, a union spokesman, mocked the widely respected Legislative Analyst's Office in an interview with The Bee, noting that none of the office-bound analysts had ever been attacked by an inmate.
"No one at the LAO's office has to wear a stab-resistant vest," Corcoran said. "If the LAO believes that the job of a correctional officer is so desirable, then why don't they take off their pocket protectors, put on a jumpsuit and come work on a tier?"
Corcoran's macho rhetoric misses the mark. No one is saying that the correctional officer's job is easy or safe. But the report includes this important fact: About 130,000 job applications are received by the prison agency every year, the equivalent of one for every 140 people in the California labor force. And with ramped up training and expanded academies, the state is hiring more officers than it is losing, reducing the number of vacancies in the prisons.
"For any particular job classification, the 'target' public employee compensation level (including pay, health benefits, retirement benefits and other benefits) should be the minimum amount necessary to attract enough qualified labor to fill authorized positions," the report said.
That's the most important point in the analysis, and it should apply to every job in government. The compensation should be determined not by the union's political clout or anyone's subjective judgment of how dangerous a position might be. The pay and benefits should be whatever it takes to recruit and retain qualified people to fill those jobs.
And right now, it appears, the current compensation package for correctional officers is more than sufficient to meet those goals.
http://www.sacbee.com/110/story/705053.html