O'Mara criticizes hiring of 'new bureaucracy' at state Department of Corrections

Albany, N.Y., August 1—State Senator Tom O’Mara (R,C-Big Flats) criticized the Cuomo administration for hiring nearly two dozen new “assistant deputy superintendents” within the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (DOCCS) at the same time that the administration has announced plans to shut down another four upstate correctional facilities, including the Monterey Shock Incarceration Correctional Facility in Schuyler County.   

The new hiring by the Cuomo administration was reported earlier this week.  According to DOCCS, twenty-two “assistant deputy superintendents,” at salaries of up to nearly $85,000 annually, are being hired to help the department comply with the federal Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003. 

O’Mara joined the New York State Correctional Officers & Police Benevolent Association in opposition to the need for the “new bureaucracy,” especially at the same time that state is shutting down correctional facilities.  

O’Mara released the following statement:   

"The hard working men and women at our correctional facilities deserve better.  It’s terrible timing and it adds insult to injury to the corrections officers and prison staff whose jobs and safety are at stake, and who could be uprooted from their homes and communities.

“It seems hard to justify closing the Monterey Shock Incarceration Facility and other correctional facilities across upstate New York with one hand while you’re hiring an expensive new layer of DOCCS bureaucracy with the other.

“It’s pretty straightforward: Now’s not the time for a new bureaucracy.  It flies in the face of trying to stretch every taxpayer dollar. 

“Too many of the Cuomo administration’s recent actions don’t appear well thought out and unfairly target our region and other struggling upstate communities.  

“I’ll say it again that we’ll continue to urge the administration to reconsider and work with us to try to find more effective and responsible ways to meet the short- and long-term goals we share.”