Topic: The Club House / Rotating post assignments

Looking for info on post assignements and how different agencies rotate post assignments.

First a little background. I work for a county jail and we work an 8 hour schedule. We tend to work a different post every day of the week except some specialty assignements that work the same post daily. Our administration is wanting to implement a static post assignment for a 30 days at a time.

Consistancy is always important, but it seems like people could get stagnant always working the same post day in and day out.

So I am asking my peers, what are the pro’s and cons from working static post assignments?

Topic: Letter of The Law / Mandated overtime?

My union does a rotating MOT list for everyone. Voluntary OT is offered first then it reverts to whoever is currently on duty and has the longest span of time since there last MOT.

Topic: The Club House / Losing control

I’ve worked in a county jail in Wa state for 14 yrs now and have definately noticed a trend. I have never worked at another facility so this is only my observation. There is a large sense of entitlement that has become more and more pervassive over my career. I believe this is in large a symptom of the generation we find comming through our facilities. The administration in my facility has always had a more liberal approach to disciplinary punishment. They are constantly questioning major infractions and often reduce or dismiss infractions entirely. Subsequently line staff become frustrated with the lack of support from administration. In my mind, dealing with a problematic inmate swiftly but fairly stops these issues from becoming the norm. When the administration reduces an infraction for a behavior problem, they undermine the authority line staff have to enforce the policies and procedures that are often written by the adminstration in the first place!

Topic: The Club House / Classification and Programs

I work at a County facility in Wa state. Our line staff and half the classification team are constantly at odds with the head of Classification, he/she also heads our programs. Our agency runs several programs like domestic violence, chemical dependency and mental health to assist inmates with issues and supposedly reduce recidivism.

We currently have a situation which is particularly trooubling as follows:

We have Inmate Doe in custody who is known to have strong gang ties as well as violence problems in and out of jail for a long time. During this current incarceration, he was deemed eligible for the Domestic Violence program by the court. He was given an opportunity and moved along in the classification system until he was placed as an inmate worker in the kitchen (which is common in our facility and part of the program). It didn’t take long and before we knew it, he was involved in a fight in the kitchen where he attempted to pull a knife on another inmate. The incident was handled avoiding serious injury to anyone.

Its been several weeks and the head of our Classification team is pushing for this inmate to be moved out of our maximum security to medium in order for him to be able to participate in his Domestic Violence program. Half the Classification team under her and most of our line staff do not feel it is safe or appropriate to move him. Most of us feel he should remain in max for the remainder of this incarceration.

My question is should programs overide calssification?
Does made eligible by the courts mean that we disregard safety and security?

At this point I feel that this Head of Classification is so far removed from line staff and our safety concerns that he/she has completeley lost perpesctive on a primary mission!

Topic: Security Central / Best way to handle unruly inmate

We have all heard these words before. Fair, Firm and Consistent! Do your best to treat every inmate this way and you can’t go wrong.

Topic: In Memory of... / CO Jayme Lee Biendl

Anyone know what came out of the federal investigation in response to the killing of Officer Jayme Biendl?

Topic: A Broader View / opinions on self defense in corrections

My department has specific self defense training. It is no where near adequate for the potential dangers we face but its better than nothing.

Topic: Everything Education / Need to measure success of offender programs?

@ dpdpar5
Sounds like you’ve highlighted some problems I see in our treatment program at the facility I work at. Unfortunately I don’t see in hope of change with the current program adminstrators or jail administration.

Topic: A Broader View / Should jails implement more rehabilitation programs?

Iv’e been working at the same agency for 12 yrs and have seen several programs come and go. I work at a County Jail where most program funding is limited to grant money from the DoJ. The two most common programs are Basic Education (High School GED) and Chemical Dependency Program (CDP). The Basic Education program is a no brainer IMO. The CDP could be a very useful program but there is not enough accountability in our program. Basically if an inmate is court ordered they are automatically accepted to the program regardless of thier suitability. Our counselors and administrators in charge of the program are very liberal. The statistics for the successful completion of the program and recivitism don’t add up according to the offenders I see returning to custody on a regular basis. It feels like we are wasting dollars on unsuitable offenders. I don’t have the magic answer but I find it hard to expect a life long offender to be court ordered to treatment and expect it sink in. You can’t expect those offenders to accept the help offered if they don’t see anything wrong with the way they have gone through life.

Topic: Letter of The Law / employment with in the criminal justice

Depends on the Agency’s policy for prior offenses. Most will make some allowances for misd offenses in your past depending on what the offense was and how long ago. Just remember one thing, do not attempt to decieve the employer during the hiring process. If you do and it comes out during an oral interview, polygraph exam or psych exam you could be removed from consideration for not being truthfull.

Most agencies actually expect some misd offenses and/ or prior drug experimentation. Again this all depends on the Agency’s policy, what offense or drugs and how long ago that all was.

Topic: Letter of The Law / transfering out of state

Depends on the State Laws and/ other Agencies Hiring Policies. In my state of Wa, you still have to attend the State Academy to work in corrections. But the agency has up to a year to send you.

Topic: Letter of The Law / Mandated overtime?

Hey there all. I’ve been a Corrections Deputy at a county jail In Wa for 12 yrs. We are always understaffed, as such our MOT gets out of control sometimes. Our MOT system does not count seniority. We have 10 deputies working per shift; out of those, who ever was hit with MOT most recently, goes to the bottom of the list. Its not perfect but seems fair enough to me. In Wa, each agency has there own MOT system. Some mando for the entire shift, some mando for half and some base it on seniority.