Copyright © 2021 Albuquerque Journal
SANTA FE – The state agency that runs New Mexico’s prison system is asking state lawmakers for $2.7 million in additional funding in the coming year – part of an overall $367 million budget request – to ramp up staffing levels at facilities in Grants and Santa Rosa.
The state Corrections Department took over management of the two prisons from private prison companies this month and agency Secretary Alisha Tafoya Lucero said Tuesday the vacancy rate for corrections officers at the Guadalupe County Correctional Facility in Santa Rosa was at 82.5% at the time of the takeover.
It’s already been reduced slightly – to about 60% – due to the hiring of new officers, but the state’s top prison official acknowledged staffing levels are still far from ideal.
“I’m not going to pretend we’re at where we need to be,” Tafoya Lucero told the Journal.
She also said the prison is currently only housing about half the inmates it can hold due to the staffing shortage, adding, “I won’t increase the population of that facility until it’s safe to do so.”
Statewide, New Mexico’s vacancy rate for corrections officers is at 31% despite efforts in recent years to increase pay levels and improve retention.
The starting pay rate for certified officers at state-run prisons is currently set at $20 per hour – compared to about $15.75 per hour at private-run prisons.
But a COVID-19 vaccine mandate for workers at hospitals, prisons and other congregate settings imposed by Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s administration does not appears to have led to a mass employee exodus, as only a small number of guards left their jobs or were dismissed for failing to comply.
Of the 2,388 corrections officers employed at state and private-run prisons around New Mexico, 2,237 have been fully vaccinated and 140 have received medial or religious exemptions, Corrections Department spokesman Eric Harrison said.
In addition, seven corrections officers were dismissed and 19 have resigned since August instead of complying with the mandate, according to the agency.
“It didn’t have as big on an effect as I thought it might,” Tafoya Lucero said Tuesday of the vaccine mandate’s impact, though she said some prisons were hit harder by resignations than others.
Some New Mexico prisons have seen COVID-19 outbreaks and there have been more than 2,900 recorded cases among inmates at the state’s 10 prisons, according to Department of Health data.
The state had 5,654 incarcerated inmates as of Tuesday – or about 73% of prison bed capacity statewide, Tafoya Lucero said.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the state’s male inmate population had dropped over 10% and the female population almost 25%, according to the New Mexico Sentencing Commission.
Sen. George Muñoz, D-Gallup, the vice chairman of the Legislative Finance Committee, said Tuesday the panel will consider the decreasing inmate population as it crafts a budget recommendation in advance of the 30-day legislative session that starts in January.
He also said the state’s law that bars retired state employees from returning to work while still collecting pension benefits is complicating efforts to ramp up staffing at the Grants prison in particular.
Overall, the Corrections Department is seeking a 1.2% budget increase for the fiscal year that starts in July 2022 – from $363.1 million to $367.3 million.
In addition to more money for staffing the Western New Mexico Correctional Facility in Grants and the Guadalupe County Correctional Facility in Santa Rosa, the agency is also seeking additional funding to expand housing options for inmates released from custody on probation and parole.
