Representatives David Hardin and Tim Turner held an interim study examining pay for Oklahoma Department of Corrections employees as agency officials reported 641 vacant positions and difficulty competing with other employers, including other state agencies.
The House Public Safety Committee heard testimony about compensation for correctional officers, support staff and administrators. Hardin, who chairs the committee, said recruiting and retaining employees is important to public safety.
“We need to understand the challenges the Department of Corrections faces in recruiting and retaining employees, as well as what is working in Oklahoma and elsewhere,” Hardin said.
Corrections Director Justin Farris said the department hired more than 3,300 employees agencywide since 2023 but lost more than 3,100 during the same period, leaving a net gain of 194 employees.
Farris said efforts to improve the work environment have helped retention, but higher pay is needed to sustain that progress.
“We’re not only losing our security staff to other states and entities that pay more, we’re also losing experienced support and administrative staff to other state agencies that offer higher salaries for positions with less supervisory responsibility,” Farris said.
The department’s human resources director, Jeannine Morton-Brown, reported that correctional officers in pay tiers two through four earn, on average, between 18% and 21.7% less than their counterparts in surrounding states.
Donald Thurmond, chief of security at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary and Jackie Brannon Minimum Security Unit, said starting pay for most Oklahoma correctional officers is $21.48 an hour. He described officers leaving jobs they valued because they could not afford to stay.
Turner said lawmakers should consider both correctional officers and the support employees who keep prisons operating.
“Adequate pay is not simply about rewarding employees,” Turner said. “It’s about recruitment, retention, safety and accountability.”
