The Michigan Department of Corrections says it wants to fix its employee shortage. Department officials say they hope improving the shortage will help another initiative – Improving the mental health of the department’s corrections officers.
A corrections officer shortage means more overtime and less stability for corrections officers. Chris Gautz is a spokesman for the department of corrections. He says hiring about 700 new corrections officers in 20-19 should help. But they’re also conducting a survey of officers to figure out what else the department can do to improve mental health in such a stressful environment.
“You know we’ve had far too many suicides in our department amongst our officer ranks and several others.”
Gautz says the department has a wellness team working on ways to improve employee mental health. That includes a hot line staff – or concerned family members – can call for help.