Our Safety Matters! IDOC employees turn up heat for safer working conditions

AFSCME report details scope of drug problem

A new report published by AFSCME Council 31 confirms what IDOC employees have long been saying: Drugs have increasingly become a massive problem in Illinois prisons, and management’s inaction has had serious consequences for staff and individuals in custody alike. 

The report, “The Growing Plague of Drugs in Prisons,” analyzes two-plus years of data regarding drug-related incidents at IDOC facilities across the state and includes interviews with more than a dozen AFSCME members.

The findings make clear that nearly every day, at every security level, IDOC employees are smelling or seeing burning smoke, being exposed to dangerous substances in cells and in mail, and facing dangerous encounters with incarcerated individuals under the influence. 

One particularly disturbing trend is the explosion in the smoking of paper covered in wasp spray, which many incarcerated individuals smuggle into the prison as legal mail. This increase in drug use has correlated with a rise in assaults on employees that in some cases has left correctional officers with life-threatening injuries from which they are still recovering.

The state’s response to the growing problem has lagged. In a letter to IDOC Acting Director LaToya Hughes, Council 31 Executive Director Roberta Lynch emphasized that “the reality is that drug use continues to grow throughout the prison system while IDOC management has been alarmingly slow to respond to this blatant rule violation and to the serious threat that it poses.”

The report includes recommendations to tackle the problem: Increased transparency around the issue, stronger measures to prevent drug smuggling through the mail, more clearly defined consequences for drug use, more in-depth training for staff on how to deal with drug exposures, and expanded drug counseling programs for incarcerated individuals committed to rehabilitation.

Council 31 lobbyists have distributed the report to state legislators, urging them to join in calling on the department to take action. 

A wake-up call for IDOC

For more than a year, AFSCME has been pressing IDOC to tackle the problem of prison drug use head on. After seeing very little progress made, AFSCME locals took to the picket line to make the public aware of the serious safety issues that correctional employees are facing across the state.

On October 17, AFSCME local unions at IDOC facilities all across the state joined together to hold informational pickets aimed at drawing the public’s—and management’s—attention to the increasing threat posed by drug use in state prisons. 

Our message emphasized that exposure to these substances has resulted in a growing number of IDOC employees suffering an array of disturbing symptoms, often requiring emergency treatment. Drugs are also believed to contribute to the increase in offender assaults on staff.

“It looks like [management] doesn’t care about staff, in my opinion. Because this isn’t something that just happened. This has been going on for two, three years,” Lance Bedar, president of AFSCME Local 943 at Pickneyville Correctional Center told The Southern Illinoisan. “Nobody likes to see their fellow workers go out in an ambulance.”

The problems are further compounded by staff shortages at most correctional centers, where in some cases, posts are either closed or only worked by one person when there should be two or three.  

The AFSCME-IDOC Standing Committee has pounded on these concerns at meeting after meeting—especially focusing on revamping the offender mail system, which is the main route for drug entry. 

But even when potential solutions are identified, IDOC management has been far too slow to implement them. And even though the department has improved hiring in recent months, it has failed to act on a number of the recommendations AFSCME made to speed up the process, leaving staff at risk.

“They constantly come up with excuses,” Eric McCubbin, president of AFSCME Local 817 at Dixon Correctional Center, told the Dixon Telegraph. “Whether it’s funding or saying we don’t have a contract for the copiers—every time we make a suggestion, they come up with an excuse.”

In taking to the picket line, AFSCME locals demonstrated the depth of the frustration with management’s slow response and made sure the wider community understands the scope of the problem. The pickets served a vital role in getting this message out, with more than 100 media hits—TV, radio, print and social media—from Chicago to Chester covering the union’s “Safety Matters” message. Locals were able to show the problem’s widespread nature, while explaining the threats that drug use, assaults, and understaffing pose to IDOC employees.

Following pickets, IDOC signs mail-scanning contract

AFSCME put the mail issue on the bargaining table during the last round of contract negotiations in 2023, and the parties agreed to the establishment of a joint labor-management working group tasked with coming up with a plan for handling mail.  

After much deliberation, an agreement was reached that the best course of action would be transitioning to a new technology that digitally scans all offender mail and then sends it to the offender electronically to be viewed on a screen. A vendor was identified and IDOC took responsibility for working out specific details with the company. Then the department informed the union that an implementation plan had been developed and would begin soon. 

That was many months ago. But still, IDOC dragged its feet. According to the department, they could not get final approval from the CMS Procurement Office, and thus could not actually sign off on the contract.

The “Safety Matters” pickets changed everything. That very day there were statements from IDOC in media reports across the state that they recognized the problem and were working to solve it—including working with the union.  

Then, less than two weeks after the pickets, AFSCME got the word from IDOC: The vendor contract was signed and the department prepared to move forward with implementation!

“We still don’t have any specifics as to where or when the new system will become operational,” said Chuck Stout, AFSCME IDOC liasion. “That’s what’s needed now.”