After more than four years of hostile negotiations that included a one-day strike, state correctional officers yesterday reluctantly ratified a new contract that for the first time in two decades wins back major rights for
management. The vote was 798 to 227.
Correctional officers, who have worked without a raise since 1995, did win an immediate pay hike of 13 percent. But they lost their fight for immediate reimbursement of back pay -- the issue that the union claimed was responsible for their walkout in July.
That back pay -- a total of $18.5 million -- will be paid out over the next four years. At a news conference in a field in front of the Maximum Security facility,
Richard Ferruccio, president of the Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers, said the settlement 'is far from perfect.'
'We did believe this was the best deal available, and our people have suffered enough.'
Ferruccio said the scars from the protracted and often-hostile negotiations run deep, and 'it will be many years before we feel we can again trust our government.'
Correctional officers, he said, remain disappointed in Corrections Director A.T. Wall as well as in Governor Almond.
Asked if he considered the vote a victory for the administration, Wall said, 'I would say the administration achieved a number of important objectives, specifically the elimination of the ironclad no-subcontracting clause, a clause that does not exist in any other Rhode Island state employee contract or in any other contract in corrections nationwide.'
'From the very beginning, it was essential for the state to obtain contractual changes to permit management to run the prison facilities efficiently and effectively,'
Almond said.
For prison administrators and Almond, the agreement signified nothing less than a fundamental shift in the balance of power at the Department of Corrections.
The contract allows, with conditions, for the state to consider privatizing some non-secure sections of the prison, such as the inmate store. And perhaps more importantly, it gives Wall more flexibility to move guards around the ACI.
The inmate store is staffed by members of the brotherhood, which costs the state hundreds of thousands a year to operate, officials have said, where in other prisons around the country, food providers actually pay the prison for a chance to sell to inmates.