COs at NorCo Jail Complain About Money, Mandates, Morale and Management

I opened my coverage of last week's Northampton County Council meetings with a story about Council President Lori Vargo Heffner's recent $3,100 junket to Tampa at taxpayer expense, followed by a question about the Eagles-Packers game. I intended to continue coverage today, but that wasn't good enough for disgruntled corrections officers. They expected a story immediately. One of them remarked, "It great that a group of county employees tell county council that the jail is in crisis we talk about a football game. Shows were [sic] our county is. Tampons and a football game. Guessing paper towels are hygiene products. Need toilet paper, Tampons, pads, just nothing to dry your hands. Just use the TP." Corrections officers have been claiming "the jail is in crisis" since I first started covering the county in 2016. I'll agree they have very difficult and stressful jobs. I appreciate their dedication, which actually has saved lives at the jail. But I honestly believe their complaints are being addressed, especially when I look at their most recent binding arbitartion. .  

At Thursday night's meeting, a group of COs flooded the room, but only two spoke, They designated AFSCME staff representative Brian Dayoc and local union President Justin Edelman, their President, to do the talking. Both read prepared statements. 

Dayoc correctly observed that corrections officers continued working during pandemic while employees at some departments were paid to stay home. This was a reference to Human Services caseworkers, who were initially permitted to work from home during the pandemic. He complained that the county denied requests for bonuses to corrections officers but handed them out at Gracedale. This is true and is because federal funds for that purpose were made available at nursing homes, but not at the jail. Dayoc cited the example of one employee with 13 years of experience who is only on step 5 of an 11-step payscale. He conceded that COs have received steps in recent contracts under the current administration but argued that does not make up for lack of steps from previous administrations. He noted that staffing levels are critically low and have resulted in mandatory overtime under which COs work 16-hour shifts. But at the same time, he said many guards depend on overtime. He said the union is opposed to scheduling changes the county has been attempting since 2015 unless they are paid more money.  

Justin Edelman, President of local 2495, read a moving CO statement from Zion Harstine, whose wife passed away in January. He has an autistic daughter and has to rely on others to take care of her while he works mandatory overtime. "My child needs me more than ever, as well as I need her. I am her father, and I will be the one to raise her, not my other family members. ... It's a shame when an employer unable to fulfill their responsibilities is now making an employee of almost 22 years choose between his family and his job. ... No employer should expect an employee to work the hours we are working ... to fill the voids that they have created. ... " Harstine's statement complains of "vindictive retaliation, bullying and trying to place fear into the employees to get what they want to fix their problems. Scare tactics that are as clear as day. I'm not alone in this. Every officer has their own story, We gave you our thoughts on how to fix the problem but it fell on deaf ears. The issue is four Ms: money, mandates, morale and management." 

After reading Harstine's statement, Edelman asserted that Executive Lamont McClure and the HR department have stopped unionized COs from bidding on other county jobs in what he says is a clear violation of the Home Rule Charter Sections 806, 807 and 1307. He stated that the county's HR department has morphed into an "enforcement agency for the bullying campaign of our Executive." 

The county's Home Rule Charter does establish a "career service designed to attract, select, and retain, on the basis of a fair and open competitive selection process, the best qualified individuals, and to impose on elected officials, officers, and employees the highest possible ethical standards." It establishes two classifications of county employees, exempt and career service. Exempt employees include elected officials and a limited number of political appointees. The rest are career service. There is no separate category for union workers. 

Section 806 specifically provides that "[n]othing in this Charter shall be construed to limit the rights granted under the laws of Pennsylvania or the United States to any employee or employee organization." And Section 807 states that "[n]o individual shall be favored or disfavored with respect to any position or office because of ... lawful activity in any employee organization."  

Historically, union employees have been permitted to bid on county jobs. The decision to prevent this is clearly a departure from established practice. 

During his report to Council, McClure told Council member Ron Heckman that he disputes the claims made by COs. "We're in the middle of a contract, which we're honoring." He was also questioned by Council members John Goffredo and John Brown concerning the decision to prevent corrections officers from bidding on county jobs. Brown asked McClure whether he believed that any county employee has the right to bid on other county jobs. "That's not my understanding," responded McClure. "Your rights, if you're in an organized unit, are determined by the four corners of your contract and you're not necessarily entitled to the mechanisms of the career service." 

This interpretation appears to fly in the face of the Home Rule Charter's express intent that the "best qualified individuals" be selected, preferably from within the county, to the best jobs available. It also is contrary to practice in the private sector, in which union members at companies like Bethlehem Steel could advance into management. 

The County's Administrative Code (Section 14.09) delineates two classes of employees at the jail. "The Director of Corrections and the Public Safety Administrator of the Northampton County Prison shall be in the exempt service. All other employees of the Prison shall be included in the career service." It makes no difference whether these employees are unionized. They still are entitled to the benefits of a career service system.

As if that were not clear enough, the Career Service Regulations provide that they "apply to any employee included in a unit covered by a collective bargaining agreement, unless specific provisions encompass the same general subjects as the career service regulations, by way of example, issues such as promotion, layoff, transfer, etc." The regulations, adopted by Council, specifically state "collective bargaining agreements shall not replace or eliminate a merit system as described by these career service regulations, the Home Rule Charter and the Administrative Code."

It appears that McClure's attempt to prevent prison employees from transferring to other jobs within the county is contrary to the Home Rule Charter, Administrative Code and Career Service Regulations. 

But does this mean that the complaints about money, mandates, morale and management are warranted? A review of the current collective bargaining agreement tells me that corrections officers are off base. 

The corrections officers are currently in the middle of a contract, decided as a result of mandatory arbitration on February 14, 2024.

Under this contract, the starting salary for a corrections officer was $41,334 in 2023, followed by two 4 1/2% step increases in 2024 and 2025. This translates to a salary increase of about 13.5% over three years. 

The contract also includes longevity pay of $300 (starting at 5 years), $1,000 (starting at 10 years), $1,750 (starting at 15 years) and $2,000 (starting at 25 years). It does require COs to contribute a little more of their salary for the rising cost of health care, depending on which medical plan they use. 

Arbitrators also noted the following: "[T]his panel notes that it has had numerous discussions regarding the effect of the current schedule. By any statistical measure, the schedule is not working efficiently and that has been affecting both the employer and the employees. The panel urges - as did its predecessors - the parties to find a way to voluntarily change the schedule by considering potential solutions before a subsequent panel chooses to take up the schedule itself and impose changes to address the obvious issue with the schedule." 

This belies Dayoc's implication to Council that the current schedule works. 

Without question, there is a staffing crisis at the jail. Though there have been 376 new hires at the jail since 2018, all but 102 are gone. The retention rate of these new hires is just 27%.

Fifty-five of these departures have been to other positions within the county, and some include promotions at the jail. But interestingly, 15 COs have left the jail to work at lower-paying county jobs like groundskeepers or 911 technicians. This contradicts the assertion that COs are leaving because of low pay. 

Since at least 2015, when John Brown was Executive, corrections officers have been urged to consider scheduling changes as a way to reduce mandated overtime and ensure coverage. Since 2015, corrections officers have refused because they don't want to lose the overtime. You can't have it both ways. You can't complain about mandated overtime while resisting an initiative designed to reduce it.