Talking to new Oregon Department of Corrections boss about challenges agency faces

Seven out of every 10 adults in the Oregon Department of Corrections have abused drugs or alcohol, and one out of five are classified as having severe mental health issues. People who are released from custody are 10 times more likely overdose on opioids than the general public. These are among the many challenges facing the new director of the Department of Corrections, Mike Reese, who took over the job late last year. Reese joins us to talk about his philosophy for managing the department.

This transcript was created by a computer and edited by a volunteer.

Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. We start today with the new director of Oregon’s Department of Corrections (DOC). Mike Reese is likely a familiar name to many Oregonians. Most recently, he was a Multnomah County sheriff. Before that he served as a chief of the Portland Police Bureau. Now, he’s in charge of one of the largest agencies in the state with more than 12,000 adults in custody and nearly 4,000 employees. And he has taken over at a time when the agency is facing multiple challenges, from staffing and smuggled drugs to poor conditions at the state’s only prison for women. He joins us now to talk about all of this. Welcome back.

Mike Reese: Dave, thank you so much.

Miller: You’ve said that you didn’t know that this job was even open when the governor’s office called you and said, we’d like you to do this. Why did you say yes?

Reese: I didn’t know the position was open, but I’ve had a lot of respect for the positive work being done in corrections and certainly saw that in my time as a Multnomah County Sheriff, the profound positive impact we can have on adults in custody when we treat them with dignity and respect and provide them with the resources that help them be successful when they leave our custody. So I saw this as an opportunity to do that on a statewide level. And I think the governor’s ideas and strategies around what we can do to improve life in Oregon, providing better behavioral health care to folks and providing more housing, that aligns with our mission at DOC. We want to make sure that when people leave our custody, that we’re doing a warm hand off to community corrections and stable housing. And while they’re in custody, we’re providing them the treatment resources they need to be successful throughout their time with us and then re-entry back into the community.

Miller: There’s a lot to dig into and everything you just said because those are important goals. Implementing them seems like it’s a challenge because you’re not the first head of the DOC to emphasize many of those same things, but a lot of them remain challenges. This is a much bigger agency than any you’ve managed in the past, and you’ve managed some large offices–the Sheriff’s Department in Multnomah County is the biggest in the state, the same as the Police Bureau for the city. What have you been doing in the last couple of months to try to get a handle on this new job?

Reese: Well, I think there’s some symmetry there. I did lead the Portland Police Bureau, the largest police agency in the state, the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office. And I saw this as an opportunity, on a statewide level, to have a positive impact on public safety. And that’s something I care very deeply about.

As I step into this new role, I’m on what I call a listening tour. I’m visiting our institutions across the state, our facilities. We’ve got 12 prisons and we run community corrections in two counties. So I’m meeting with staff and the adults in custody, talking to local leaders and trying to figure out how I can be of service to the agency and then also what do we need to do to move forward?

Miller: What are the questions you find that you’ve been asking when you talk to adults in custody? That is the phrase that’s sort of taken over in recent years in correction circles for inmates.

Reese: Well, we want to treat people with dignity and respect, and I think acknowledging the path forward for them is through us, working with them and humanizing the relationship between our corrections professionals, the staff that work in the prison. So it’s doctors, nurses, food service folks. It’s a small city in each of these institutions that we have. And so it’s humanizing the relationship between our staff and the adults in custody and making sure, again, that we’re providing them the resources they need to be successful when they re-enter. I think the biggest mindset change in corrections right now is that we’re not guards anymore guarding people in custody, the inmates; we are actually helping people heal from the trauma that they’ve had in their life.

Miller: How do you hire with that in mind?

Reese: It’s challenging. Hiring anywhere in public safety, I believe, right now is one of the biggest issues whether you’re a chief of police or a sheriff or you’re running corrections agencies across the United States. I think that’s the biggest challenge. The job market is really constrained. We want to hire the very best people. So do a lot of other businesses and it’s super competitive.

For us at DOC, I think what makes it even more challenging is that we’re hiring from some local markets like Pendleton and Umatilla where we’ve got some staffing issues. We’ve got a lot of competition from Amazon or other large employers there and our hiring practices, because we want to make sure we’re hiring the right people for this job, it takes a while to vet them. So when you start that employment process with us, it’s a written test. It’s also going to require psychological exams, medical tests. All of that takes time, the background process. So three to four months after you’ve applied, is when you’re going to start. Amazon may start you a week later. So I think that’s a challenge for us.

Miller: What is the staffing situation right now in terms of the funded positions that aren’t even filled?

Reese: Now, we’ve got over 200 vacancies right now out of 4,000 employees. And that’s statewide in all of our positions. We have about 4,400 employees. We’ve got about 200 corrections officer vacancies. In some institutions, it’s really dire and the staff are working a lot of mandatory overtime shifts and that’s hard on them and their families. We’re doing everything we can to be agile, maybe moving populations of adults in custody from one institution to another to help relieve some of that strain on staff because some of our institutions are fully staffed.

Miller: We’ve talked a lot about the hiring and the retention challenges that all kinds of employers are facing, but it seems pretty clear to me that working in a prison is different from working at Amazon or at a sawmill or at a coffee shop or at a hospital. What are the particular challenges of hiring for a prison?

Reese: Well, you’re looking at a 24/7 operation and it’s seniority based. We have labor associations. So as a new employee, you’re coming into an organization where you’re going to work potentially an off shift. So you’re working the night shift, you’re working swing shifts. It makes it hard for family life and maybe hobbies and pursuits that you have that you want to do when you’re not at work. And then the fact that you’re the lowest in seniority means that if you want the weekend off, you’re going to have to wait maybe several years to be able to bid for a shift that allows you to have the days off and the work hours that you want. So I think that’s a challenge in public safety.

Miller: What about the stresses of the job? Everything you’re talking about seems like it would add to the stress and add to the work-home life challenges. But what about just when you’re at work itself?

Reese: I think there’s some unique challenges in corrections. It can be an environment especially…I was telling you before the show started, I worked at OSP last night until midnight and that’s an aging facility and it feels oppressive. It was built much like Alcatraz. So if you’ve ever been on a tour of Alcatraz, that’s really what OSP feels like. That’s an oppressive environment that doesn’t really lead to the modern corrections practices that we have now. Our employees feel that strain.

Miller: What do you see as a connection between the well-being of adults in custody and the well-being of staff?

Reese: I think when you treat people with dignity and respect and you help them, the positive role model that corrections officers have with the adults in custody and the ability to give them the resources that they need, the adults in custody, it says something about who you are. And it makes you feel like the work you’re doing has meaning and that it has an impact on the safety of our community. When we reduce recidivism–so when the adults in custody leave our care and they’re successful– means our community is safer.

Miller: What is the recidivism rate broadly right now?

Reese: The criminal justice commission manages that, and you can go on their website and look. They’re updating their process of how they’re doing it, but in the past, it’s been about 40%.

Miller: That’s within two years?

Reese: Three years.

Miller: Within three years, meaning about 40% will reoffend in some way. Almost half of people who are out of prison within three years, will do something else to get caught up in the criminal justice system.

Reese: Yes, that could be an arrest, a conviction or some sort of process.

Miller: A state-ordered report that came out in August, meaning before you took this job but about your new job, found a number of serious problems at Coffee Creek. That’s the state’s only prison for women. Among other things, it found that the prison has a retaliatory culture that discouraged the reporting of sexual abuse and other wrongdoing. I assume even though this report came out before you took over as director that you have read it. What’s your response to it?

Reese: I think the gender-informed practices assessment, the GIPA report, is a roadmap for us to be successful, not just at Coffee Creek but across all of our institutions. I think there’s some brilliant thinking and how we can have a gender-informed approach to corrections and we’ve got a lot of work to do at Coffee Creek. We have really committed staff that want to do that work. And I’ve attended advisory councils. We’ve got an adult in custody advisory council that meets with staff, they’re working on a lot of these issues. But how do we improve the environment that we live and work in? The governor has got an advisory council that also helps manage that process and we are committed to doing better.

Miller: In response to that report. Governor Kotek ordered that some changes be made relatively quickly within 60 days that included things like more security cameras, more classes, better fitting clothing. And then she also created this advisory committee that you mentioned that’s been meeting behind closed doors to make longer term recommendations about things like discipline and housing. So some bigger issues.

Reese: Correct.

Miller: So where does that stand? When might substantive changes be made?

Reese: Well, some of those things have already happened. So the clothing issue, for example. We are in the process of issuing appropriate clothing to the women in custody, not clothing that was designed for the men, but clothing that’s designed for the women.

Miller: Just to be clear that that’s not a fashion issue, that’s a safety and a health issue.

Reese: And it reinforces human dignity when you’ve got clothing that’s appropriate, it makes you feel better. There are some changes that have happened–the classes, the program implementation. So a lot of good work’s been done. There’s a lot more to do and I think that process will take a while.

Miller: But what specifically remains to be done? And I should say the part of the legal context here is something which I know you can’t talk about, but you were named as a defendant in a lawsuit filed just last month by a woman at Coffee Creek, who had very specific allegations but that broadly get to bigger picture questions about accountability and culture, not even just at Coffee Creek but at all prisons. These are serious allegations about corrections officers retaliating against inmates who speak up. What are you going to do to change that?

Reese: Well, let me say that misconduct, criminal misconduct, of any nature by a corrections professional is reprehensible and we’re going to hold that person accountable. And it really upsets me personally and our staff that are doing good work when we have somebody engage in that misconduct because it takes away from our credibility and our legitimacy and paints all of us with a broad brush. So I think setting clear boundaries and having discipline systems that work and that hold people accountable. I mean, I own that.

Miller: I want to turn to drugs in prison. Noelle Crombie at the Oregonian had a really eye-opening article about this issue back in September. She found that the number of positive drug tests among inmates has skyrocketed and that drugs are being smuggled into prisons in a bewildering number of ways–in the book bindings of books, soaked into the pages of magazines, embedded in the lining of envelopes like a birthday card or something. How do you prevent drugs? And these seem like tiny, tiny little bits of things that can be almost seamlessly hidden. How do you prevent them from coming into prisons?

Reese: It’s super challenging. I think you have to look at the underlying issue that’s driving some of that behavior by the adults in custody. Over 60% of our adults in custody have a substance use disorder and about 10% of that is an opioid issue. So there is a desire by those folks that have used and abused drugs in the past to try and acquire them while they’re in custody and they’ll use whatever means possible. We have some interdiction efforts underway. The legislature in the last biennium provided funding for two canine officers and the drug detection dogs. So we’re currently selecting the officers and then we’ll match them with the dog and send them to training.

That’ll help with the detection in mail rooms and places like that in the institution. We’re also testing wastewater treatment. So we’re starting to do that on March 1st and that’ll give us a sense of what the scope of the problem is and particularly what drugs are being abused.

And then there’s other efforts. We have scanners in the mail rooms. We have mail staff that are looking through the mail. Every piece of mail gets reviewed that’s coming through for just those substances that you’re talking about.

Miller: Even that one. That struck me as one more huge challenge that you’re facing because birthday cards from kids or mail from loved ones from family or books and magazines, I guess they could be both a way for some people to smuggle drugs in. They’re also a lifeline and a kind of prosocial connection to the outside world, the outside world that the vast majority of inmates are going to go back to. And so even there, I imagine you don’t want to say you can’t have this mail. But I mean, one option I’ve seen that other states have done is just to take pictures of these things. So the physical mail, people won’t even get it. They’ll just see a digital copy of all of it, which makes sense drug-wise, but it doesn’t make sense in terms of maintaining more meaningful connections to the outside world. It’s a balancing act.

Reese: It is a balancing act, and we want to support those connections to family and friends, the loved ones that are going to be there when that person is released, but we also have a responsibility to keep them safe while they’re in custody. And our staff. And drugs are a huge issue.

Miller: You mentioned that the earlier issue here that’s leading to this is addiction to begin with.

Reese: Right.

Miller: So what can you do to boost availability of meaningful treatment and groups, which for years we have heard can be very challenging for people in Oregon prisons to actually get access to.

Reese: I think that’s our responsibility. The legislature again funded some enhanced substance use disorder treatment programs. And we’re hiring the staff to start implementing that. Because of the impact of opioids in our community, we’ve got to start providing treatment to those folks coming into custody that lasts throughout the time that they’re incarcerated. In the past, we’ve had breaks in that. So if somebody comes in and they’re on methadone, if they’re a woman and they’re in custody and pregnant, we’re going to continue that methadone treatment for a while while they’re in custody and then they’re going to go off of that and go back on maybe Suboxone or something 13 months before they’re released, or a year before they’re released. We know now that what we have to do is provide that treatment throughout the time that they’re incarcerated. So we’re stepping up our game, if you will, on the medical side.

I’m super excited to see this in our agency because it’s going to help people maintain themselves throughout the period of incarceration. We’re going to have medication-assisted treatment, whether it’s Suboxone or Sublocade or Vivitrol. Those are really, I think, life-saving drugs that can provide protection for someone from overdosing, but also help with their treatment plan that’s going to be a lifetime plan.

Miller: Most recently, you were the Multnomah County Sheriff, which oversees the county lockup, but you spent the bulk of your law enforcement career at the Portland Police Bureau, which is in a sense sort of upstream from lockup. It’s what happens before trial and before people end up in prison where you’re overseeing now. I’m just curious how you think your time as a police officer, as a police chief, affects the way you think about prison.

Reese: That’s a really good question, Dave. I think what I learned as I was working on the implementation of this Justice Reinvestment…As chief of police. I was part of our local coordinating council that was implementing House Bill 3194, the Justice Reinvestment, and it was a great collaboration with people like Rod Underhill and Lane Borg from the Defenders Office. Scott Taylor from Community Corrections, myself, staff from the Sheriff’s Office. And coming together and creating alignment and systems, actually led to better outcomes. And Multnomah County was super successful in reducing recidivism and giving people a second chance, an opportunity to be successful. And it works and it opened my eyes, again, to that profound positive impact we can have on community safety through our correction system. And it really made me interested as chief of police in the Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office position. And when that became an option, I ran for office and was elected. And now as the Department of Corrections director, I think I can have that impact statewide - helping our professionals and our agency and our stakeholders all create alignment throughout our systems.

Miller: How much do you think that you, and the entire Department of Corrections, should be judged on what happens after people leave prison? Over and over you’ve talked about the importance of reducing recidivism. At the beginning, you talked about employment and housing after people leave relationships with community corrections. If we’re talking about the results of three years after people leave prison, how much of that do you think is up to the work that you do while people are in prison?

Reese: I think you can hold us accountable for using evidence-based practices and giving people the resources and tools necessary to be successful. Not everybody accepts those resources.

Miller: I don’t mean to imply that you should be held responsible for individuals but broad trends and recidivism rates.

Reese: I think that’s fair. I would expect that the recidivism rate would drop when we start using evidence-based practices and providing people the treatment resources they need, whether it’s a mental health issue or a substance use disorder issue. We want to provide those resources. We also want people to be job ready. So we’ve got some great employment opportunities and skill building that we’re doing in custody so that when people leave our custody, they’re employment ready. And some of them are stepping into really high paying jobs in the construction industry or into other positions in our society.

Miller: What would you say to Oregonians who say no, what you’re talking about is making life cushier for people who’ve done terrible things?

Reese: Well, let’s talk first about what our punishment is. It’s the loss of freedom. So the court makes a decision when someone has been convicted that there is a sentence applied to that and a loss of freedom, if you’re incarcerated. It could be in a jail system, could be in a prison system if it’s a felony conviction. And that is the punishment. Our job in corrections is to provide the resources that help people be successful when they leave. 90% of the folks in our custody are going back into the community.

They have a release date when they get released. We’re going to make our community safer if they don’t reoffend.

Miller: Mike Reese, thanks very much.

Reese: Thank you.

Miller: Mike Reese is the new director of Oregon’s Department of Corrections.

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