North Carolina DPS to temporarily suspend operations at 3 prisons

RALEIGH, N.C. (WNCN) – The North Carolina Department of Public Safety has opted to suspend operations at three minimum-security prisons in an effort to curb staffing challenges at other facilities, according to a news release issued Tuesday evening.

Hoke Correctional Institution in Raeford, Tyrrell Prison Work Farm in Columbia, and Odom Correctional Institute in Jackson will have their operations suspended “in the near future,” the release said.

The reasoning behind the decision is to deploy staff to neighboring prisons with high correctional officer vacancy rates. The statewide vacancy rate in August was estimated at 21 percent, NCDPS said.

The temporary suspensions will take place in phases, beginning with the Hoke Correctional Institution. Then, the redeployment of employees and moving of offenders to other facilities will happen in phases over the next few months, the release said.

“Prison administration has researched the suspension of operations at select facilities to counter the effect of an increasing employee vacancy rate on facility safety and security,” said ACJJ Chief Deputy Secretary Tim Moose. “We will continue to explore all options to aid in reducing vacancy rates and keeping our employees and communities safe.”

Commissioner of Prisons Todd Ishee added: “Employees will be temporarily reassigned to help their colleagues at facilities with high vacancy issues. We value our employees and our goal is to reassign staff such that the temporary reassignments are accomplished with minimal disruption to families.”

Other changes that will take place over the coming months include, per the news release:

Designating Anson CI’s male minimum custody facility as the South Central region’s reentry facility, replacing Hoke Correctional Institution.
Returning Neuse Correctional Institution from a female facility to a male medium custody facility, housing primarily offenders with chronic health conditions. The facility was used to house female offenders during the remissioning of Anson Correctional Institution from a male to a female facility.
Remissioning Hyde Correctional Institution from a male medium/minimum custody prison to house only male minimum custody offenders.