‘Staffing crisis’ in Texas prisons makes staff, inmates and public less safe – Houston Public Media

Adrees Latif / Reuters

Multiple Texas prisons are almost impossible to staff, and the agency responsible for more than 100,000 inmates currently isn’t set up to address it.

That and other critiques were levied against the Texas Department of Criminal Justice by the Sunset Advisory Commission staff report this week.

Sunset reports are used to analyze the usefulness and efficacy of departments in Texas government, at times recommending they be abolished.

The Sunset Advisory Commission believes the agency that spent nearly $4 billion last year has system flaws that the 189 page report detailed and recommended fixes for.

Outdated technology, lax oversight of its rehabilitation programs, and especially staffing were just a few of the things making the whole system dangerous for inmates and staff and the public, the report detailed.

The state has been at around a 25% vacancy rate for years. An April Corrections Officers report generated by TDCJ showed many prisons were half or sometimes less than 40% staffed.

The prisons are more violent than a decade ago, with “adverse events” rising approximately 30% since 2014.

“Even while the inmate population decreased, the amount of contraband such as drugs, weapons, and cellphones found in TDCJ facilities has increased significantly over the last 10 years,” the report said.

Employees are working more, harder and dropping more balls.

According to the report, TDCJ is violating its own policies by allowing guards to work more than 16 hours a day or 10 day in a row. In Fiscal 2019, the state was violating this policy 9,000 times each month on average.

This leads to increased staff discontent and more resignations, in a negative feedback loop.

“While some staff proactively seek overtime, half of the respondents to Sunset’s correctional staff survey said the amount of extra time they must work negatively impacts officer safety, and more than 40 percent of respondents said it negatively impacts the safety of inmates and the public,” said the report.

The report links the “crisis staffing” levels to thee deadly escape of Gonzalo Lopez in 2022. Lopez escaped a medical transport because of cut corners and staffing insufficiencies the report said. Lopez would go on to slay a family of five in Leon County.

In a statement, TDCJ staff said it appreciated the work of Sunset Commission staff. “We look forward to sharing information about TDCJ’s continuous improvement efforts — including those focused on work culture — with Sunset members, so that they may have a comprehensive understanding of our operations and services,” said Amanda Hernandez, director of communications for TDCJ.

Guards see their workplaces as unfair and overly punitive as well in staff surveys that showed the top complaint was a hostile workplace (33%).

The report also highlighted the ineffective disciplinary policies and how they are employed. “TDCJ historically has embraced a strictly hierarchical culture that insufficiently holds upper-level staff accountable,” said the report.

With 20% of all parole officers and more than that for other staff have received at least one disciplinary action, Sunset staff said the punishments aren’t effective deterrents.

Inmate safety could be linked to increased suicides.

Suicides are also more than double what they were in Texas prisons a decade ago, and fiscal 2024 saw the highest in more than two decades at 65 deaths.

“It is absolutely predictable,” said Michele Deitch, director of Prison and Jail Innovation Lab at the University of Texas at Austin.

“When you’ve got that kind of vacancy rate — it means that they’re not available to observe the population and they’re not experienced enough to identify when people are at risk of suicide,” she added.

Many of the recommendations from Sunset staff revolved around addressing the department’s staffing crisis. They suggested, among other things, consolidating and expanding its workforce retention support functions and collecting feedback from current and separating staff and to analyze it.

Dozens more dealt with the need for better strategic planning, updated technology, and better oversight.

“This report is just one step of the process, and we are eager to continue collaborating with the Commission staff, the Commission, and the Legislature during the upcoming session,” Hernandez said.

The Sunset Commission, made up of legislators and members of the public, will decide which recommendations to adopt and write legislation around the documents in the next session.