Thursday, July 20, 2000

The Oregon Department of Corrections is looking for a few good men. And women. And, for that matter, their kids.

A strong economy plus a building boom of prisons equals a shrinking labor pool for corrections. Flush times have pushed recruiters to new turf, including high school classrooms, in hopes of attracting tomorrow's corrections officers.

"We're trying to plant the seed," said Gary Kilmer, recruitment director.

Five years ago, the state employed just more than 2,000 people in its prisons. Today, that's up to 3,322. By 2010, there will be more than 5,000 officers and non-security workers staffing the 13 prisons standing today plus the five on the drawing boards, according to corrections projections.

By this time next year, there will be 282 correction officers where there were none last year, at Two Rivers Correctional Institution in Umatilla, and about that many nonsecurity employees. Ditto for Coffee Creek Correctional Institution for women, slated to open in sections in Wilsonville in 2001 and 2002.

In leaner times, applicants have lined up for prison jobs. Not so today, when professionals have a broader choice of careers. "It's an applicant market at the moment," Kilmer said.

A note on the online posting for correction officers reads "Open Until Further Notice."

Nationally, law enforcement agencies are struggling to fill retirees' desks. The Portland Police Bureau has gone as far as Alaska and Hawaii in search of recruits, and it recently relaxed its education requirements to further broaden the pool.

But prisons remain a particularly tough sell. Consider the built-in challenges: Most new prisons will open in rural areas far from big cities, with limited access to large population pools and community colleges, especially any offering a corrections-related curriculum.

Add to that the so-called "Gen X Gap." Nationwide, government offices are already underrepresented by employees younger than 35 -- about one in four, compared with almost one in two in the private sector. Raised on "Escape from Alcatraz," "Shawshank Redemption" and countless other officers-as-oppressors flicks, Oregon's young people have shown Kilmer a particular distaste for prison work.

Behold the college job fair.

Kilmer, more than most, suffers in conversation the two most hated words among corrections officers: prison guard. As in, coming from a college student passing his booth, "Who wants to be a prison guard?"

An energetic man, especially when talking about corrections careers, Kilmer answers, even following the student. "We're not guards, we're officers. Did you know that?" he recalled in his Salem office recently, reciting his responses. "There's 140 jobs in corrections. Did you know that? Did you know . . . "

"There just aren't many positive role models in terms of corrections officers," he says. "It's just not as sexy as being a police officer. You can't sell that glamour. I think it's far more rewarding work -- working closely with a group of people over time and really setting an example for them to follow."

His brochures quote chipper corrections officers: "Each day is different. There is so much variety in the work, and the interaction with people makes it interesting." "The opportunities for advancement are phenomenal!"

Other strategies appeal, if not to the imaginative, then to the practical. Oregon pays its corrections officers a median $35,100 salary, almost $5,000 more than the national median.

Idaho starts at $23,982. Kilmer does well in Idaho. Better than half the employees at Oregon's nearby Snake River Correctional Institution in Ontario cross the state line to get to work.

He recruits nationwide via the Internet, and throughout the West in person. In Washington, he boasts Oregon's superior retirement package. In California and its giant penal system, he points out Oregon's relative manageability.

"You want to market your product to make it look as shiny and new as you can," Kilmer said.

Correction officers must be 21 years old with a high school or equivalent degree, and measure up to standard law enforcement physical requirements and background checks before beginning training.

The latest recruitment strategy targets the youngest pool of potential employees, high-schoolers age 15 to 18, through the state's School-to-Work internship and career-planning program. It's a chilling signpost of penal expansion, luring today's teens to work in prisons yet unbuilt.

Interested teens will "shadow" corrections officers and other prison staff during regular shifts.

Hopefully.

"I get everything set up for the job shadow," said recruitment officer Rhonda Crawford, "and then the parents won't allow them to come. That's happened twice."