Rob Sand Meets with Correctional Officers, Talks Public Safety, Staffing Shortage, and Workers’ Rights

Neil Lemaster, nurse at Iowa State Penitentiary in Fort Madison: “I feel like I’m sacrificing my safety.”

DES MOINES, IA – Yesterday, nominee for governor Rob Sand met with Iowa correctional officers and other workers in the state prison system for a roundtable discussion about public safety, staffing, and working conditions. The conversation comes on the heels of the announcement of “Public Safety Leaders for Rob,” a coalition of more than 60 law enforcement officers, prosecutors, first responders, paramedics, firefighters and other public safety officials supporting Sand’s campaign.

During the roundtable, correctional officers spoke candidly about the realities of working in Iowa’s prisons, including staffing shortages, pay competitiveness, and the safety risks they face on the job. Participants talked about their concerns being overlooked by the Reynolds administration, particularly as the state has passed a new law expected to increase Iowa’s prison population while correctional facilities are already struggling with staffing shortages. They also discussed their collective bargaining rights under Iowa’s Chapter 20, which limits the subjects public employee unions can bargain over. Rob believes Iowa should treat correctional officers like the public safety professionals they are and give them a meaningful voice in making their workplaces safer and more effective.

Learn more about Rob’s roundtable below:

WATCH:

KCCI: Rob Sand backs prison workers as public safety staff amid Iowa staffing shortage, overcrowding

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Rob Sand said he would support classifying prison employees as public safety workers to give them access to more bargaining rights under Iowa law.
Neil Lemaster, who works at the Iowa State Penitentiary in Fort Madison, said Iowa prisons are overcrowded and understaffed, putting prison employees in more potentially dangerous situations. Lemaster said while private-sector jobs offered better pay, he made the choice to work in the state prison system because of access to Iowa Public Employees’ Retirement System (IPERS). But, he said, low wages, increased overtime and unsafe working conditions have made him feel “trapped” in his job.
Lemaster and other speakers said they believed the staffing shortage could be solved by providing higher wages for prison employees. However, they said the 2017 law making major changes to Chapter 20 of Iowa Code significantly limited their ability to bargain for benefits, safety and hours. The law, which limits public employee unions to bargaining only for base wages, does contain exemptions for public safety employees, like law enforcement and firefighters — but does not include workers in Iowa’s correctional facilities.

KGAN: Rob Sand says correctional workers should be able to negotiate workplace safety

Democratic candidate for governor Rob Sand met with corrections officers and prison workers to hear about the challenges they face on the job. Workers pointed to staffing shortages and high turnover, which they say are driven in part by low pay and the dangerous nature of the work.
Under current law, correctional officers are not classified as public safety employees. That limits their collective bargaining to base pay, while public safety employees can also negotiate over issues including overtime and safety conditions.
“To me, if you work in a correctional facility, obviously, you should be able to be pushing for and negotiating for your own safety around convicted criminals,” Sand said.

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Iowa Capital Dispatch: Sand supports letting Iowa prison workers bargain as public safety employees

Sand met Tuesday with correctional officers and others working in the state’s prison system for a roundtable discussion at the Des Moines headquarters for AFSCME Council 61, a public sector union. Roundtable participants told Sand, who currently serves as Iowa auditor, about problems they saw in Iowa’s prison system.
Neil Lemaster, who works at the Iowa State Penitentiary in Fort Madison, said Iowa prisons are overcrowded and understaffed, putting prison employees in more potentially dangerous situations.
“I never looked at it like that until recently, where I felt trapped in my job because I can’t leave because I’m close to retirement,” [Lemaster] said. “I’m 52 years old, and and I got to wait three years to retire — I have over 30 (years) in, but it’s getting so bad. I was telling my wife, who’s a retired correctional officer, I was like, ‘I feel like I’m like sacrificing my safety.’ I’m like, ‘I don’t know if I’m going to be murdered at work for retirement.’”

Radio Iowa: Sand says prison staff should be classified as public safety employees, expanding their bargaining rights

Rob Sand, the Democratic Party’s nominee for governor, says it makes sense to classify staff in Iowa’s prison system as public safety employees, which would give them the right to raise more issues when they’re negotiating contracts.
Sand made his comments Tuesday during a forum at the headquarters for AFSCME Council 61, the union that represents prison staff and other employees who work in state and local government in Iowa. Neal Lamaster, a registered nurse at the Iowa State Penitentiary in Fort Madison, said the prison is so understaffed a colleague recently worked 180 hours in a two-week period and 100 of those hours were overtime. “You’re trying to do more with less and you want to help, but you get to a point where what do you do?” Lamaster said.
During yesterday’s forum with Sand, seven other prison employees raised concerns about high staff turnover and a lack of mental health treatment for juvenile offenders. A few told Sand a new Iowa law requiring mandatory 20 year prison sentences after a third felony or violent misdemeanor conviction will likely force the state to build a new prison.

WHO Radio: Iowa Corrections Staff Ask Governor Nominee For Help With Low Pay, Understaffing

Corrections staff told Democratic nominee for Governor Rob Sand the law requiring mandatory sentences for repeat felons will force the state to build new prisons.
“If you’re building more and your can’t staff the ones that you have, how’s that going to work out? So, clearly what we’re doing right now is not working. And nobody knows that better than the people who have been injured on the job or the families of those who have been injured on the job or killed on the job,” Sand said.
“The staffing issues alone have created such excess overtime throughout the system. Up to this point, they’ve spent $5.5 million dollars just on overtime and anticipate spending another $3 million, so a total of $8 million dollars this year,” [Todd Copley, President of AFSCME Council 61, who represents Iowa corrections staff] said.