Jail Guard Understaffing Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

Regional Jails Undergo Investment Reform, Recruitment Efforts

Regional jails in West Virginia have long struggled with staffing and safety issues. Investment reforms and recruiting efforts from state leadership aim to solve these issues.

As West Virginia’s strained jail system faces ongoing safety concerns, reinvestment and recruitment efforts aim to amend facility issues on a state level.

The Legislative Oversight Committee on Regional Jail and Correctional Facility Authority convened for a public meeting Monday at the State Capitol. Their meeting centered around changes to staffing and oversight in the state’s jail facilities.

West Virginia’s jail system has come under national scrutiny for the alleged mistreatment of people who are incarcerated, including neglect, water deprivation and the deaths of tens of individuals in less than five years.

Last year, eight correctional officers at Southern Regional Jail in Beaver were charged over an assault that led to the death of a man who was incarcerated in the facility.

Carl Reynolds, senior legal and policy advisor at the Council of State Governments (CSG) Justice Center, spoke to lawmakers about “justice reinvestment” — the reallocation of funds from jails to other areas of the criminal justice system.

By providing investments “further upstream,” like in law enforcement, victim services and parole supervision, Reynolds said the state’s jail system can reduce expenses associated with incarceration.

The CSG Justice Center uses federal funds to work with officials on the state level and analyze data pertaining to state criminal justice systems. They then advise state leadership on potential changes to make.

Justice reinvestment refers to the reallocation of funding for jails toward other areas of the criminal justice system.

*Photo Credit: Will Price/WV Legislative Photography*

Reynolds said representatives from his organization have met with leaders from all three branches of government in West Virginia and have received approval to pursue this work in the Mountain State.

Justice reinvestment is an idea that West Virginia has recently begun to embrace.

Gov. Jim Justice awarded more than $2.6 million in grant funds to treatment supervision programs across the state in 2023, followed by an additional $2.4 million in 2024. These programs offer substance abuse interventions to some individuals convicted of felony drug offenses.

Reynolds said that his organization is currently collecting information and ideas from state officials on how to approach reinvestment efforts in West Virginia.

“This is an open-minded, open-ended process where we want to find out what’s important to you all and to the other stakeholders in the system,” he said.

In the meantime, recruitment efforts in West Virginia jails could also address issues in the West Virginia corrections system, according to Pat Mirandy, chief of staff for the West Virginia Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation (DCR).

Mirandy said Monday that recruitment efforts have been “nothing more than miraculous over the past few months.”

Since Jan. 1, Mirandy said the DCR has hired 291 correctional officers and 49 additional, non-officer personnel members. Also since Jan. 1, 162 individuals have completed DCR corrections training, he said.

Pat Mirandy, chief of staff for the West Virginia Division of Corrections and Rehabilitation, updates lawmakers on recruitment efforts in West Virginia’s jail system.

*Photo Credit: Will Price/WV Legislative Photography*

Union representatives have long said that understaffing in the state’s jail system has created additional safety risks for workers, which also extend to individuals who are incarcerated.

In 2022, Justice issued a state of emergency proclamation over the staffing issues, which allowed members of the West Virginia National Guard to fill in vacancies in the jail system.

But the ongoing recruiting efforts could mean National Guard members will no longer be needed in the state’s jail system, Mirandy said.

At the beginning of the year, Mirandy said 413 National Guard members were working for the DCR. Now, that number has fallen to approximately 80.

During the meeting, Del. Bryan Ward, R-Hardy, said these staffing improvements marked “a lot to be proud of” for the agency.

Mirandy said that by May the DCR anticipates only five guard members will remain with the agency, staying on to complete “paperwork that needed to be done to close out the soldiers that we had in our facilities.”

“Because of the success of our recruiting efforts, we’ve been able to draw down the National Guard’s footprint in our agency,” he said. “Our plan to eventually achieve no guardsmen in our facilities will be a reality soon.”

W.Va. Correction Commissioner Says Jails System Improving

Corrections Commissioner William Marshall said for the first time since COVID-19 hit, jail and prison guard vacancies have fallen below 1,000 – standing at 990.

We have a class of 55 right now that will graduate next month,” Marshall said. “Our previous class we graduated was 45. And the class before that was 53. So we’ve made some significant hires and some significant impact when it comes to recruiting”

Correctional guard vacancies were recently up to 1,100. Speaking Monday before the Legislative Oversight Committee on Regional Jails and Prisons, Marshall said the $21.1 million the legislature approved for pay raises is helping grow guard academy classes and retirees are coming back to work.

Marshall said changes in the six week class – getting recruits out on the floors at two and a half weeks – gives recruits and supervisors decision making experiences.

“It gives them an opportunity to see if this job fits them or not,” Marshall said. “It also gives the superintendent and the lieutenants and sergeants the opportunity to see how they respond on the floor, how they respond around inmates.”

Marshall said the new academy teaching plan also allows savings when it comes to training.

“We’re not training someone for six weeks at the academy, then they show up the first week in a facility like this and think, ‘This is not what I thought it was,’ and they’re walking out the door,” Marshall said. “We’ve already spent $18 to $20,000 on training. And so this has really greatly helped that.”

Marshal said 330 to 340 National Guard members, under emergency orders, continue to staff non-inmate contact posts at correctional facilities.

“We’re working towards trying to eliminate as many of those as we can going forward,” Marshall said. “As long as we continue to hire, we continue to bring new recruits in.”

He said a new comprehensive recruiting campaign is just underway, including a young public information officer hiree who is well versed in social media.

“We’ve started a new campaign with the Department of Commerce in regards to recruiting,” Marshall said. “We’re on the verge of releasing a new stand alone logo for our division, to try to attract some of the newer, younger generation of workers that would want to come and work for us, whether it be officers, counselors, therapists or office assistants.”

Marshall told the committee that, while a few facilities are at or just under capacity, some overcrowding continues. He said North Central Regional Jail in Doddridge County, with a population of more than 800, is about 300 inamtes over capacity.

“It’s just such a hotbed of an area right now when it comes to drug crimes and crimes in general that are feeding into North Central,” Marshall said.

Marshall said over the last calendar year, there was a point where they hired about 700 people, but lost about 650.

“Those numbers are starting to slow down,” he said. “Obviously because of the new pay plan. I’ve received several waivers recently, which is a good sign for the academy, which means we got people coming back that are already academy trained.”

Overcrowding and understaffing, along with physical conditions in the jail system, have sparked numerous lawsuits, alleging dangerous and deplorable living facilities.

Marshall said $60 million in eight deferred maintenance projects are underway statewide.

“We’ve also been working with some energy savings groups with the potential of working with them in order to get some additional projects completed in our jails and prisons and juvenile centers as well,” Marshall said.

He mentioned one project that would have a company set up a HVAC class for inmates at Salem.

“That company is also looking at fixing a lot of our HVAC systems going forward that are ready,” Marshall said. “Instead of trying to fix them by just completely replacing them.”

He said a new initiative called Desert Waters specifically offers mental mental health care for corrections officers.

“It’s another tool for our people to be able to talk to people,” Marshall said. “To be able to share experiences with people who actually speak their language and know what they are saying,”

Marshall told the interim committee that he’s hopeful, with new recruiting efforts, pay raises, retention plans and maintenance upgrades, the emergency crisis within the corrections system will lessen over time.

“The one thing that I knew coming into this job in January is, we were never going to conquer this,” Marshall said. “It will constantly be a challenge that we’ve accepted and I think we’re heading in the right direction.”