SCC workers notified of layoffs

 The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has announced it would send layoff notices to 1,443 employees including 35 at Sierra Conservation Center.

The State Restriction of Appointments letters were sent Thursday to employees affected by a $250 million budget reduction in adult offender rehabilitation and other programs for inmates and parolees announced two weeks ago, a CDCR press statement said.
 

“This is the first step in the layoff process due to reductions in response to the department’s plan to achieve a $1.2 billion budget reduction,” the CDCR said.    

The rehabilitation program reductions will impact education, vocational, substance abuse and other programs for inmates and parolees. This reduction represents over one-third of the adult programs budget, and leaves about $350 million in the adult programs budget.

While 35 letters will be sent to SCC workers, prison officials expect only 18 people will be affected, said CDCR Spokeswoman Peggy Bengs.

“More are sent out than get it,” Bengs said.

Furthermore, those who receive letters will have priority for open positions, Bengs said.

This is the first round of layoffs to affect SCC in 2009, said Lt. Kevin Wise, prison spokesman.

Letters were sent out earlier in the year, “but nothing materialized,” Wise said.

According to the prison system, overall, CDCR officials anticipate program-related reductions to eliminate more than 1,000 positions. However, because of existing vacancies, the number of actual layoffs is expected to be somewhere between 600 and 900, depending upon final labor negotiations. Also, more Restriction of Appointments  letters must be sent than the actual number of anticipated layoffs due to the complexities of the civil service layoff process, the CDCR said.

In other prison news, termination letters were sent to eight contractors who provide substance abuse services inside the state’s prisons. These terminations affect 24 individual contracts.

A new round of contracts will be completed and some contractors may be re-contracted, Bengs said.