February 11, 2016
By Barbara Hoberock
...During his first weeks on the job, (click here) Allbaugh has been visiting prisons.
And he has seen a lot: low morale among underpaid correctional officers; programs that work but don’t have enough support; doors and locks on cells that don’t work but still house offenders; individuals at community centers and halfway houses that are not supervised properly; a draconian paper filing system to keep track of offender histories; holes in fences; and a system at 122 percent of capacity.
He described the bare bones staffing at the correctional officer level as “unnerving.”
“The overriding story is that there is a problem in the Department of Corrections,” Allbaugh said. “And the governor, Legislature and society as a whole have ownership of this problem.”
He points to mandatory sentences that send offenders to prison for long stays.
He supports sentencing reform but said it is not the agency’s “bailiwick.”
“That is not what we do,” he said.
While he said he is not a fan of using private prisons, given the state’s situation, they are a relief valve for the state, he said.
“Right now, (the private prisons) are saving our bacon,” he said.
Private prisons in Sayre and Watonga could be used to help relieve pressure on state prisons, he said....
By Andrew Knittle
Oklahoma City — Last year, (click here) a pair of out-of-state private prison companies received a record $92.7 million from the state Corrections Department for housing Oklahoma inmates, a necessary expense to deal with the state’s persistent overcrowding problem, agency officials say.
Since 2004, the state has spent roughly $975 million on contracts with the two for-profit corrections enterprises operating in Oklahoma, based in Florida and Tennessee.
So far this fiscal year, which ends June 30, the two companies have received roughly $55 million.
Recent spending trends, as well as comments made earlier in the week by interim DOC Director Joe Allbaugh, suggest that number will continue to climb.
I betcha everyone in the state legislature and governor's office is being paid. Oklahoma is where some of the wealthiest petroleum companies and stockholders in the world live and the people of Oklahoma can't even pay their guards at it's prison facilities.
March 27, 2016
By AP
Oklahoma City — As leaders in the Oklahoma House and Senate (click here) struggle to close a $1.3 billion budget hole, Republicans behind the scenes are jockeying for powerful state government positions that will be vacant after this fall’s election.
Leadership in the Senate is likely to pass from President Pro Tempore Brian Bingman of Sapulpa, who is term-limited, to No. 2 Republican leader Mike Schulz of Altus, who has two years left on his term. But in the House, a spirited race is developing to replace outgoing Speaker Jeff Hickman of Fairview.
Besides overseeing their chambers’ operations and developing policy, the speaker and president pro tem are responsible for negotiating with the governor on how to divvy up roughly $6 billion a year from the state’s General Revenue Fund. Neither position has served as much of a springboard to higher office: Of those who held the positions in the past two decades, only former Speaker Todd Hiett won another election....
