Local counties still struggling to keep jails fully staffed
AUGUSTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) - We’re continuing coverage on conditions at the Burke County Jail.
We told you about how it needs repairs. However, officials tell us it’s also experiencing staffing issues.
Two counties, Burke and Richmond, have lost a lot of staffing in their jails.
“We’re having trouble recruiting and retraining, recruiting and training personnel. We are eight persons short in a detention center,” said Burke County Sheriff Alfonzo Williams.
Richmond County Sheriff’s Office Col. Calvin Chew said: “Seventy personnel that were down in the jail, which causing a lot of issues.”
This isn’t anything new, but Richmond County says the shortages are on a new level.
“It started about a year or two ago, but it ebbs and flows all the time. It’s not like we haven’t had shortages before. We’ve always had shortages. It’s just more so now than ever,” he said.
Shortages are causing employees to pull more weight.
“They’re working their regular hours, and then they got to come in overtime after that. And it’s long hours,” said Chew.
Williams said: “Our employees are on mandatory overtime work schedules. On their days off, they can’t be off because they have to come in and work.”
In Burke County, there’s been a sharp decrease in their employees in the past weeks.
“We’re currently saying in the past three weeks we’ve had six persons to quit,” said Williams.
Richmond County is seeing some light at the end of the tunnel.
Chew said: “We interviewed five people today. Hopefully, in the next week or so, we’ll have five more. So hopefully, it’s starting to progress. We’re starting to see that we’re getting people coming in the door.”
Burke County officials say they will continue to go to job fairs to help the issue. Richmond County has looked into adding incentives to make their county more attractive, but with the size of the office, they say it is a lot harder to create those benefits due to budget constraints.
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