By Phil Kabler
The Charleston Gazette
CHARLESTON, W. Va. — The state Division of Corrections continues to have troubles filling jobs, with the Mount Olive and Huttonsville correctional centers presenting the biggest problems, Corrections Commissioner Jim Rubenstein told legislators Monday.
Rubenstein said the rural locations of the prisons, in Fayette and Randolph counties, and the availability of better-paying jobs makes it difficult to recruit and retain correctional officers and other prison staff.
Currently, Huttonsville has 68 vacancies, including 57 for correctional officers, while Mount Olive has 65 vacancies, including 55 correctional officer positions.
Rubenstein said Corrections is losing employees to federal prisons in the state, and to businesses involved in the booming Marcellus Shale oil and gas fields, both of which offer significantly higher salaries than state prisons.
“We just have folks who are supporting their families who are taking better-paying jobs,” he said.
Another issue with the vacancies is that prison employees can be required to extend normal 12-hour shifts by four hours to assure that critical posts are staffed, he said.
“Everybody likes a little bit of overtime, but it gets to be an albatross, and that’s what we’re seeing at both facilities,” Rubenstein said.
“When you get numerous vacancies, you wear people out,” he said of mandatory overtime.
Rubenstein said Corrections has also temporarily assigned staffers from other state prisons to Huttonsville or Mount Olive to address staffing shortages.
Also Monday, Division of Motor Vehicles Commissioner Steve Dale told the Legislative Oversight Committee on Regional Jails and Corrections that the DMV is upgrading state license plate production to flat plates that are digitally printed, not embossed, but said production of the plates will stay with Prison Industries.
“Prison Industries will continue to manufacture these plates with new equipment,” Dale said. “In my 32 years with the DMV, our relationship with Prison Industries, which of course is part of the Division of Corrections, has always been excellent.”
Dale said the DMV is hoping to conclude negotiations with IBM for a 10-year contract for the new equipment by mid-December.
He said some digital plates, produced under contract with IBM, are currently in circulation, including specialty plates for the state sesquicentennial, Friends of Coal, and the new black bear wildlife plate.
Dale said that once the new equipment is installed, a priority will be to issue replacement plates for older special organization plates, many of which are more than 20 years old.
“A lot of these have been on the backs of cars since 1992,” he said.