By Todd Karpovich
Baltimore Sun
BALTIMORE — Maryland’s prison system paid $203.3 million in employee overtime in fiscal 2025, but a state audit found that workers routinely exceeded the department’s 80-hour-per-pay-period overtime limit and that required preapprovals were not always documented.
“We acknowledge the findings and recommendations that were made as the result of this audit,” Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services Secretary Carolyn J. Scruggs wrote in a response to the Office of Legislative Audits.
The DPSCS said its Office of the Inspector General will conduct periodic follow-up reviews to monitor compliance.
The audit found 6,631 instances during fiscal 2025 in which 1,203 DPSCS employees were paid for working more than 80 hours of overtime in a single pay period. That included 121 employees who worked more than 100 hours of overtime in a pay period and five employees who exceeded 140 hours in a single pay period.
The overtime problem was not new. Auditors said similar conditions were identified in two previous audits dating to September 2019. DPSCS had agreed to implement recommendations from the previous audit by August 2023, but department officials told auditors they could not enforce existing policies or maintain the related controls because of correctional officer staffing shortages.
DPSCS officials also told auditors that several factors contributed to the overtime, including the need to maintain 24-hour staffing at correctional facilities, special assignments such as hospital visits and employees earning overtime on days when they use leave, other than sick leave, under the department’s union agreement.
The audit examined regional operations for the period from Jan. 22, 2022, through March 8, 2026, including five regional fiscal offices serving 18 correctional and pretrial facilities and the Division of Parole and Probation. Those operations had about $1.5 billion in expenditures during fiscal 2025.
Auditors reviewed eight facilities that accounted for $108.6 million, or 53%, of DPSCS’ total overtime payments in fiscal 2025. Four facilities, which paid $50.1 million in overtime, told auditors they did not document required preapproval of overtime. At four other facilities, auditors tested 718 hours of overtime worked by nine employees and found that preapproval was not documented for 397 hours worked by eight employees, totaling $21,000.
In one instance, DPSCS determined that 12 hours of overtime totaling $560 had been recorded in error and took action to recover the money.
The audit also found that DPSCS’ reviews of overtime did not effectively prevent employees from exceeding the 80-hour limit.
Auditors recommended that the department require preapproval of overtime or prohibit employees from working overtime without it and establish controls to prevent employees from exceeding 80 overtime hours in a pay period. Both recommendations were repeats from the previous audit.
DPSCS agreed to both recommendations and set Nov. 30, 2026, as its estimated completion date. The department said it will review its existing corrective-action plan, make improvements and conduct audits to verify compliance.
The department also said it is negotiating a new union agreement that would revise its overtime policy and potentially allow limited exceptions to the preapproval and 80-hour requirements when the exceptions are documented and authorized.
The audit also included a cybersecurity finding that was redacted from the publicly available report under state law. The Office of Legislative Audits said DPSCS agreed with that finding and its recommendations, but the details and the department’s response were withheld from the public report.
The Office of Legislative Audits said it reviewed DPSCS’ response and would notify the department if additional clarification was needed to ensure its responses adequately addressed the findings.
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