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| Ill. Gov. Picks New Prison Chief |
| By Urbana/Champaign News-Gazette |
| Published: 02/14/2003 |
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As a man who has spent his entire career in corrections, Ernesto Velasco said he knows what tools an officer needs to succeed. That knowledge will be essential for his new job as director of the Illinois Department of Corrections. 'I am proud to have selected for this position someone who will serve as an inspirational leader to all of those employees and to people across the state,' said Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who announced Velasco's appointment Tuesday in Chicago. According to Blagojevich, Velasco, 50, is the first Cook County Jail director to achieve that title by rising up through the ranks. He started as a corrections officer there in 1972 and worked his way up to director by 1996. 'I spent my entire adult life in corrections,' Velasco said. 'That's all I know.' Henry Bayer, executive director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31, said Velasco's experience as a correctional officer is a good sign, but he will still have to prove himself to an agency that is 'dangerously understaffed' and suffering from low morale. 'We've seen in the past where people rise up through the ranks and forget where they come from,' Bayer said. 'We hope that he is going to have a keen understanding of the needs of front-line employees and that he will be responsive to those needs.' A hiring freeze ordered by Gov. George Ryan and extended by Blagojevich, plus an early retirement offer last year, has cut the number of front-line corrections employees by more than 2,000 people in the last year, he said. Bayer said he would like to see Velasco reshape the department to make sure that the resources are concentrated at the bottom, where they are most needed, and to try to rebuild morale among the employees. Velasco, whose first day on the job is Feb. 24, was tight-lipped about his plans regarding staffing levels or anything else. 'To be honest with you, what I want to do first is get in there and find out how things are operating,' he said. 'I have not really had a chance to do a walk-through or make myself familiarized with the agency.' The Illinois Department of Corrections has about 43,000 inmates, almost four times as many as the Cook County Jail system. It will be a challenge, but Velasco said he is used to hard work. He moved to Chicago as a 13-year-old Mexican immigrant, raised by a single mother. He did not speak English when he arrived. 'I was given an opportunity,' Velasco said. 'If you apply yourself, there is nothing that you can't achieve and this is what this country is all about: to shoot for a goal. In that respect, I have been very fortunate.' Velasco said his first order of business is asking the correctional officers for their support as he starts his new job. |
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