Isle prisons pay Guards in the state prisons collect an average $22,000 a year in overtime and average 27 sick leave days a year, state Auditor Marion Higa said in a report released yesterday.
guards $22,000
OT on average
The state auditor also reports
guards average 27 paid
sick days per yearFrom staff and news reports
Several guards make more in overtime than in regular pay, she said.
One corrections officer whose base pay is $33,396 a year earned $38,303 in overtime, for a total of $71,699, the report said.
Public Safety Department Director Ted Sakai acknowledged problems with overtime and sick leave but said there have been improvements over previous years that the audit did not adequately acknowledge.
The overtime was reduced to $7.4 million in 2001 from $7.8 million in 2000 and $9.8 million in fiscal year 1999, despite a 10 percent to 20 percent increase in the base salaries, Sakai said.
He said the department now has a good program in place to identify and discipline sick-leave abusers. However, he added, "making the program work is much more difficult than the auditor would have you believe."
Higa's report that overtime is driven by sick leave and vacancies is "a gross oversimplification" of a situation that has a myriad of factors, he said.
For example, he said, many inmates are mentally ill or suicidal and need to be watched 24 hours a day, and much of that has to be covered by overtime.
"What your report fails to mention, or perhaps, what your staff doesn't know is that all seven-day-per-week, 24-hour-per-day operations will incur some level of overtime because no matter what the circumstance, staff must provide a certain level of coverage to maintain security and safety," Sakai said in his written response to the audit.
The problem is especially acute at the Women's Community Correctional Center because of requirements that most posts can only be staffed by female officers, he said in a written response to the audit. "If a gender-specific post is vacant because the designated (guard) is absent, then we must find another woman to fill the vacancy, even if that woman will be on overtime, and even if there is a male (guard) available on regular time," he said.
The auditor's report said the average 27 sick-leave days a year for prison workers compares with an average 10 days for other state employees.
In an interview yesterday, Sakai said "the auditor doesn't acknowledge that working conditions are a lot tougher than for other state workers. After all, we are dealing with inmates.
"Every correctional institution in the country is having a problem with sick leave, but we're working hard" to deal with the problem, he said.
Higa's audit noted that prison overpayments, usually resulting from sick leave taken when none is available, totals $1.8 million, of which the department estimates nearly $600,000 is uncollectible.
Sakai said the problem is in the state's payroll system, yet the department has reduced the figure from $3 million in 1999.
Higa's report said the average overtime for all employees at all facilities averaged $4,710 in the past fiscal year.
"The department was not aware of the situation and was unable to explain why this occurred," Higa said. "The department does not monitor individual (corrections officer) overtime but instead focuses on each facility's overtime costs in the aggregate."