OPEA

Contact:  Mark Beutler, Director of Communications

405.524.6764 (o)

405.429.0533 (c)

MarkB@OPEA.org                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

May 23, 2008

For Immediate Release:

Critical shortages at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester are being spotlighted by the OSP Chapter of the Oklahoma Public Employees Association (OPEA).  The Association, which represents state employees, is stepping up campaign efforts over the next 90 days and asks for support from the entire city of McAlester.

 “Officers are working two, sometimes three, overtime shifts each week and are reaching the point of exhaustion.  As a result, OPEA has started a ‘Standing Together for Safety’ campaign designed to rally the employees at the prison around a common goal of stopping mandatory overtime,” said OPEA Deputy Director Scott Barger.

 “The campaign is also designed to educate the citizens of McAlester and encourage their support of safe working conditions inside the prison.  We have set a deadline for resolving the mandatory overtime issue within the next 90 days,” Barger said. 

OSP Chapter President Randall Lopez, an officer at OSP, said “We are still very concerned with the staffing shortages, mandatory overtime and numerous policy changes such as shift rotations that unnecessarily divide our staff.  We have been very patient in working with the administration about this but we have seen very little change.

“We are asking all the employees to begin wearing bracelets with our safety message on them for the next 90 days as we try to resolve this dangerous issue,” Lopez said.  “We are also asking citizens and businesses of McAlester to get involved by placing a sign in their window supporting our efforts.”

Lopez pointes to the staffing of the prison which calls for 402 officers working security.  “Today, if none have quit, we have 265 officers working three shifts, and many of them are coming off a double shift or getting ready to start one,” he said.

 “We are down around 35 percent in our security staff alone.  We are down in the non-uniformed ranks as well.  Case managers, nursing, maintenance and food services employees are all working very short handed and struggling to keep this prison afloat.

“The staff is committed to working through the crisis but asks for more input into the decisions being made,” Lopez said.  “We are asking for OSP to put together an employee task force made up of a cross section of all the employees.  This task force ideally would look at our situation and offer constructive improvements.

“Many times the changes offered without line employees input are counter productive and lead to greater staff frustration and more resignations,” Lopez added.  “This task force is not the answer to all the problems plaguing this prison, but it will help.”

Additional solutions the OPEA Chapter is pursuing:

• Ending mandatory overtime in the next 90 days. 
• Support the changing of the DOC Sergeant’s position into an automatic career progression.
• Changing state law to mandate the payment of overtime from time-and-a-half, to double time at all 24-hour facilities.
• Implement shift differentials as another way of providing incentives to employees working shift work.

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