New Florida Prisons Chief Wants More Money, More Oversight

January 21, 2015

In her first appearance before the Legislature since taking the helm of the Florida Department of Corrections two weeks ago, a candid Secretary Julie Jones painted a picture of an understaffed agency embattled by a crumbling infrastructure, skyrocketing numbers of mentally ill prisoners and private health-care vendors who aren’t living up to their contract requirements.

Jones, who came out of retirement after being tapped by Gov. Rick Scott to become the first woman to lead the agency, told the Senate Criminal Justice Committee on Tuesday that she needs more money to fill vacant positions, which she blamed in part for mistreatment of inmates by prison guards.

“Staffing is key to lowering the temperature in these facilities,” Jones said. “It’s going to take all hands on deck and it’s going to take a true change in how we look at the role of the corrections officers and also the expectations of what those corrections officers, what services, they deliver to those inmates. Quite frankly, it’s a service. They’re there to keep them happy and they’re there to keep them healthy … and do it in such a way that they enter the facility in the same way that they exit the facility. And we’re not doing that.”

The staffing boost is part of a wide-ranging agenda Jones laid out that includes possibly terminating or renegotiating contracts with prison health-care vendors, intensive training for guards who deal with mentally ill patients and a “direct line” to the agency’s inspector general, who now answers to Scott’s inspector general Melinda Miguel.

Lawmakers cut nearly $1 billion — and did away with more than 1,000 positions — from the department’s $2.1 billion budget over the past four years, committee Chairman Greg Evers, R-Baker, noted.

Earlier in the day, Jones told reporters she plans to ask for $17 million to “fully fund” positions now vacant in security and administrative positions and another $15 million to fix what she called a “crumbling infrastructure” that includes one prison that was built in 1913 and is still operating.

After the meeting, Evers, whose Panhandle district includes three prisons and several work camps, put some of the onus on the Legislature for a prison system now under state and federal scrutiny for inmate deaths and corruption. The agency is also grappling with lawsuits from whistleblowers who claim they faced retaliation for exposing cover-ups of inmate abuse. And the Florida Department of Law Enforcement is investigating the deaths of more than 100 prisoners who died behind bars.

“I think the Legislature has a cross to bear,” Evers told reporters.

Evers said he was uncertain if Jones’ request for increased staffing went far enough.

“I can tell you how far we will go. We will go to the point that when you go to prison that you will be given the opportunity to enter the Department of Corrections. You will be allowed to rehabilitate yourself … and you will come out alive on the other side and not leave the prison in a body bag,” he said.

Jones also told the committee she was dissatisfied with the privatization of health-care services, ordered by the Legislature in 2011 but tied up in court until 2013. Missouri-based Corizon won a five-year, $1.2 billion contract to provide health care to prisoners in North and Central Florida and Wexford Health Services is being paid $240 million over five years to provide health services to nine prisons in South Florida.

Jones said she is talking with both companies about terminating the contracts, renegotiating the deals or putting them out to bid again.

“The standard of health care with our current providers is not at the level that’s required by their contracts,” said Jones, a former head of the Florida Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles who was named last month by Scott to take over the Department of Corrections.

Jones veered from testimony her predecessors had given regarding private prisons. Sen. Rob Bradley, R-Fleming Island, asked Jones if it was true that private prisons were able to “cherry pick” cheaper prisoners.

“That is my belief,” she said.

Scott tried to convince lawmakers to privatize a major portion of the state’s prisons two years ago, but the measure failed by a single vote in the Senate.

After the meeting, Jones paused when asked if she “broke the code” by criticizing the private prisons. “I don’t know. I’m a very plain-spoken, honest person. And we’re going to keep doing what we’re doing in order to get this thing fixed,” she said.

by Dara Kam, The News Service of Florida

Comments

7 Responses to “New Florida Prisons Chief Wants More Money, More Oversight”

  1. what the hell on January 25th, 2015 3:39 pm

    Concern proud parent of two law enforcement officers why is it the inmates have all the right. Officers has no right Rick Scott need to give them a raise and get off his power struggle they putting their life on the line when they enter those gates they don’t stand alone God got their back..

  2. Mark on January 25th, 2015 10:19 am

    The Florida Department of Corrections has an obligation to the citizens of the state. Its employees swore to uphold the law. Correctional officers have a primary duty of ensuring that individuals, proven to be felons by a jury of their peers, are SAFE and SECURE while they are incarcerated. Safety and security does not equal “happiness”.
    Prison is not an amusement park. It is a place where felons go to be punished for crimes they chose to commit. Inmates have the right to be safe, fed, housed, and cared for if they are sick…..nothing more. The fact that they are given opportunities to learn and work is an added bonus.
    The fact that the Secretary believes that correctional officers offer a “service” to inmates is disturbing.

  3. cj on January 22nd, 2015 6:01 am

    If the comments were made – that the Corections Officers are to keep inmates happy, then that person needs to go back to school and get some common sense!

  4. Einstein on January 22nd, 2015 12:26 am

    I have to post this quote from this idiot prison secretary that was in this article. Did I read it correctly? She said “Quite frankly, it’s a service. They’re there to keep them happy and they’re there to keep them healthy … and do it in such a way that they enter the facility in the same way that they exit the facility. And we’re not doing that.”
    They are there to keep them happy. She needs to be fired.

  5. RAM on January 21st, 2015 1:52 pm

    Maybe if they would take the correctional officer’s out of the clerical positions and put them in the security positions they were hired to do and get paid for then they might not be so short. That would open positions for non-security personnel that doesn’t get the higher risk pay like the secruity positon does. This saves $$ in the long run….

  6. John Johnson on January 21st, 2015 9:02 am

    Ponch:
    “I don’t know who the bigger idiot is, him for hiring someone to lead an agency in a field they’ve never worked in and don’t understand, or you for accepting it and making some of the statements that were quoted in this article”.

    He is..no wait..she is…no…he is…wait, wait..uhmmm…she is..that’s not right…

    He is for hiring her!! It is amazing how certain State “employees” keep resurfacing.

    So tired of this guy’s silly decisions on the folks that run certain State agencies.

  7. Ponch on January 21st, 2015 2:23 am

    Correctional Officers are not there to deliver a service to the inmate population, Secretary Jones. The service is to the tax-paying citizens of the state of Florida, to provide a piece of mind that the convicted felon that killed their parents, raped their sister, molested their child, sold drugs to their brother, etc. is safely locked away behind bars. Hopefully for that service, the victims or family of, may be able to sleep at night. There are services and programs within the prison that provide the inmates with certain necessities or privileges, but the State or the contractors provide those services.

    Providing people with their identification cards and driver’s license is a service. That appears to be your field of expertise. You clearly have no idea what you are doing. Your boss is the genius that took all that money and positions away from the agency, and you’re going to ask for it back and tell him he was wrong?

    I don’t know who the bigger idiot is, him for hiring someone to lead an agency in a field they’ve never worked in and don’t understand, or you for accepting it and making some of the statements that were quoted in this article.

Written by William Reynolds · Filed Under News