By GARRY RAYNO, InDepthNH.org
CONCORD — With half of the corrections officer positions vacant, the Department of Corrections has used overtime at double pay to cover the open shifts.
Friday, the agency’s commissioner sought an additional $12 million appropriation to cover some of the estimated $27 million shortfall in the overtime account in the agency’s budget this fiscal year.
In the past, the agency has used the money allocated to unfilled positions to cover overtime expenses, which have increased largely due to a negotiated agreement paying double for overtime for all but the major in the corrections staff.
But last year, Republican budget writers stripped the agency of nearly 60 positions because they were not filled, and that has significantly reduced the department’s ability to cover the overtime costs, according to commissioner William Hart.
The reductions and other budget decisions cut the department’s budget by $6.7 million for the current fiscal year.
“The Department’s overall overtime hours have remained consistent over the past seven years, however, the cost of those overtime hours has increased by 35 percent,” Hart wrote to the Joint Legislative Fiscal Committee seeking the $12 million allocation.
The department has to use overtime to maintain institutional security and inmate care, Hart told the committee.
He said the department recently used an advertising blitz to attract 160 applicants that produced 12 people for the police corrections academy and that class will graduate about 10 later this month.
The department will try a new highly directed marketing campaign over social media and cable for former military personnel or with law enforcement experience, which Hart said he hopes produces 30 to 35 people for another academy class in September.
He said they are also looking at changing the process to become a certified corrections officer for the state.
If someone is a corrections officer in Massachusetts or Connecticut, he said, they would not have to go through the entire academy program but would take the law package classes which are specific for New Hampshire.
He said they are also looking at similar ways to certify officers for the state who are or have been county corrections officers.
The department is also exploring using county corrections officers for part-time work at the state prisons to also increase coverage at the facilities.
And Hart said the department is offering a $10,000 signing bonus for successful completion of the academy program that will require the person to work for one year as a corrections officer for the state.
With all this, “overtime continues to be significant due to continued high vacancy rates albeit these rates are improving with the highest we’ve seen of 54 percent in December 2023, to now, a vacancy rate of 50 percent,” Hart told the committee.
Committee chair Rep. Ken Weyler, R-Kingston, said the double pay for overtime throws the budget off a bit, and asked if the number of inmates has been declining.
Hart said that was the trend for the last decade, but about 18 months ago the population saw a slight increase and that trend has been continuing steadily since.
The department expects to come before the committee in June seeking additional money for the overtime shortfall but intends to transfer the money from vacant positions which will cover about $7 million of the overtime costs.
Sen. James Gray, R-Rochester, said the committee will see how the department does between now and the end of the fiscal year to determine what might be approved for additional appropriations.
The committee approved the $12 million appropriation.
The committee also approved a Health and Human Services Department request to transfer funds within the department to cover programs that are likely to have shortfalls this fiscal year, particularly developmentally disabled programs.
The transfers amount to $29.6 million with the largest changes being reducing the Medicaid budget by $22 million while increasing the developmental services budget by that amount.
Several of the committee members wanted to know why the transfers were so large for the developmentally disabled budget, and HHS chief financial officer Nathan White said they began developing this year’s budget in August 2024, and then noticed an increase in that area at the end of last fiscal year, primarily due to system changes and delayed billing left over from the pandemic as well as many new people qualifying for the services and the costs of the services increasing.
With a budget close to half a billion dollars, he said, being off by a percent or two translates into large numbers.
He reminded the committee the budget they adopted last year cut the Department’s appropriation by more than $100 million from the previous year so they are trying to make transfers to cover the state’s obligations within tight constraints.
White said there is a provision in House Bill 1, one of the two budget bills, that allows the department to come before the committee and ask for an additional appropriation, but the agency did not want to do that.
The committee approved the request.
Garry Rayno may be reached at garry.rayno@yahoo.com.