For Immediate Release
Friday, August 24, 2001
Momentum Continues as Corrections Workers Petition With AFSCME
Frankfurt, KY —State corrections workers petitioned the Kentucky Labor Department today for a union election with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, AFL-CIO (AFSCME), saying they need relief from dangerously low staffing levels and poverty wages. Workers announced their historic campaign with news events here and at three correctional facilities including Kentucky State Reformatory near Louisville.
The corrections petition, covering 3,300 workers, comes two days after the Labor Department scheduled the first election under Gov. Patton's executive order, an October mail ballot involving healthcare workers. Workers filed for that election August 8 with AFSCME and Service Employees International Union-Healthcare Workers United.
"State workers are on the move with AFSCME," said Joyce Bradley, a Corrections Officer at Kentucky Correctional Institute for Women. "We need a strong voice on the job, and real power to win better pay and health insurance. Corrections workers from Illinois, Ohio and Iowa have achieved impressive improvements organizing with AFSCME. We, too, can win by uniting all corrections workers working for the state."
"Some of our officers must pay as much as $400 monthly for health insurance," said Connie Frederick, a Corrections Officer from Northpoint Training Center. "That's $4,800 taken out of our pay each year. When you consider the fact that most of us average about $20,000 a year, that insurance cost is a major blow to our paycheck. And now we learn health insurance is going up again!"
Frederick also pointed to a turnover rate of 28 percent, almost twice the national average, as evidence of a major staffing crisis. "Thirty-eight percent of our officers quit before their probationary period is up," he said. "Our inmate-to-officer ratio is the seventh worst in the country. It's time to organize for change."
Corrections workers gathered in uniforms at three state correctional facilities-Kentucky State Reformatory in LaGrange; Eastern Kentucky Correctional Complex in West Liberty; and Green River Correctional Complex in Central City-to declare their goal to organize with AFSCME.
AFSCME is one of four unions comprising the Public Employee Alliance of Kentucky (PEAK), a coalition of unions actively organizing in all nine categories covered by the governor's recent executive order.
"Now we will start speaking with one voice through our own organization," Frederick said. "We are excited to be working with AFSCME, the largest public service and corrections union in America, with a membership of 1.3 million including 80,000 corrections workers. That depth of experience means better representation-and the tools we need to make an impact in the legislature when necessary."
Source: Inmate ratios and turnover rates are the latest available figures from The Corrections Yearbook, published by the Criminal Justice Institute, Inc., Middletown, Conn.
