Senate reconvenes at 2:30 Sunday, resumes work to keep prison funding secure for 2012

Time is running out on the 2011 regular session of the Louisiana Legislature and by this time next week, there will either be tears of joy or despair in Washington Parish, along with four other parishes in the state.

That’s because HB1, the state’s budget bill, will have been settled and five state prisons — including B.B. “Sixty” Rayburn Correctional Center in Angie, will know the future of the facility and its employees.

The final push for funding begins when the Senate reconvenes at 2:30 p.m. Sunday to continue the review of the bill. After the Senate is finished, the bill will go back to the House for a final vote. Gov. Bobby Jindal has said that he will sign the bill if the House agrees with the Senate’s work.

The legislation has been much discussed since word first came out that $25 million in budget  cuts to the Louisiana Department  of Public Safety and Corrections budget would result in the closure of the prisons.

This past week, however, senators went over the bill with a fine-tooth comb — reversing some cuts made in the House and moving money around from department to department and agency to agency.

On Wednesday, members of Senate Finance Committee announced they had worked to the point that closure of the prisons could be avoided.

“I'm under the impression that the way that we handled it is going to not require any closure of any prisons," Sen. Jack Donahue (R-Covington).

“They shuffled some funding around, things the House didn’t consider,” Sen. Ben Nevers (D, Bogalusa) said. “Money is back in the appropriations bill to fund keeping Rayburn open.”

The House had cut $27.5 million, roughly 5 percent of the total budget of the state Department of Public Safety and Corrections (DOC), earlier in the legislative session. Those proposed cuts prompted DOC Secretary James M. LeBlanc to send letters to the wardens of the five prisons, outlining the state's "layoff timetable" and setting July 17 as the employee termination date. The memo, which was published on wpnewsblog on Friday, June 3, caused widespread panic in Washington Parish.

"It would seem hard that with a 5 percent cut, it would trigger the closing of all these prisons," said Donahue, "but as they gave testimony, you could start to understand what some of the problems were. I believed them, so we did our best to try to restore those funds."

There are more than 300 employees at Rayburn — and the four other prisons have similar personnel counts. Rayburn must cut 46 positions before the start of fiscal year 2012 on July 1. Thus far, according prison officials, 31 slots have been eliminated through attrition

The Governor's Office said Wednesday they were working through the details of the Senate plan, but said they believe if the House approves it, the five prisons can be kept open.

The 2011 regular session of the Louisiana legislature ends Thursday, June 23.