By Max Reinhart
The Detroit News
DETROIT — Months after Michigan corrections officers said staffing at the state’s prisons had dropped to “dangerous” levels that may require National Guard assistance, the state Department of Corrections says help is on the way.
The Michigan Department of Corrections has announced that 224 new officers graduated Friday from the Lower Peninsula Officer Recruit Training Academy in Lansing as part of the academy’s winter class. Another 40 graduated last month from the winter training academy in the Upper Peninsula.
The department said Friday’s graduation marks the second straight recruit training class with strong numbers. In the fall, 281 new students enrolled — a 55% increase from the prior graduating class and the largest number of new recruits in a single class since 2015.
“We are excited this sizeable class of recruits has completed their academy training and are ready to begin serving across Michigan,” Department of Corrections Director Heidi Washington said in a statement. “We are incredibly proud to welcome them to the department along with their 40 counterparts in the Northern Region cohort class who graduated last month. I thank them all for choosing a career in corrections.”
The graduation came one day after the Michigan Office of the Auditor General released reports that raised more concerns about the safety of Michigan’s prisons. State auditors said they were able to carry “a welding rod, a flat piece of stainless steel and a piece of welded scrap metal” through the metal detectors at one facility without detection. They also determined that corrections officers often failed to properly search vehicles and prisoners’ cells.
The findings drew complaints of insufficient officer training and faulty equipment, in addition to dire staffing issues.
The newly graduated officers will help to reduce vacancies at facilities across the state, the Corrections Department said. That’s welcome news for tightly staffed prisons throughout Michigan , some of which have job vacancy rates over 30%, according to an MDOC report.
In July, the president of the union that represents Michigan corrections officers said in a letter to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer that prison guards were being forced to work mandatory 16-hour overtime shifts and, at times, with “far less than the required numbers of officers.”
Byron Osborn, president of the Michigan Corrections Organization, said at that time that officers needed immediate solutions from the state Legislature and Department of Corrections because they were at “the point of desperation.”
The department said it has since undertaken “significant recruitment efforts such as increasing the number of recruitment events, implementing targeted outreach strategies, and developing marketing campaigns to increase interest in the department.”
According to a Feb. 10 staffing report on the department’s website, MDOC recently contracted with PFM Group Consulting LLC to develop a comprehensive look at the department’s staffing challenges and to develop plans to “remove barriers for potential recruits and current employees.”
MDOC operates 26 facilities across the state. According to the online report, 11 of them had a vacancy rate of 20% or worse and three had vacancy rates over 30% as of February. The report shows there were 956 vacant positions among 5,530 total jobs, or about 17%, throughout all the Michigan prisons.
The report does note that the number of facilities with vacancy rates of 30% or higher has dropped by 10% from the previous quarter.
The newest corrections graduates started their eight-week training in early February. At the academy, students receive hands-on training focused on physical drills, search procedures, CPR and first aid, de-escalation techniques and other skills, MDOC said.
The department is now recruiting for the next Northern Region training academy, which will begin on April 14, and the Lower Peninsula training academy, which will begin on April 28 .
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