The Adult Correctional Institutions is turning to a device usually reserved for riots and other security crises as a way to save money due to the state's budget shortfall. The ACI in Cranston has scheduled 14 days of "lockdowns," during which a majority of inmates remain confined in their cells for most of the day.

Keeping the inmates locked up means that fewer guards are needed to watch them, according to Albert A. Bucci, a Department of Corrections spokesman. Bucci says the hoped-for savings is $152,950 during a 12-month period that began in July.

Prisoners are usually allowed out of their cells about eight hours a day. Bucci would not say how many outside hours have been cut during the budget-related lockdowns. He says, however, that the lockdowns aren't as drastic as those imposed during a security crisis, when inmates are kept in their cells except for brief periods.

During budget lockdowns, inmates are allowed out for meals, to meet with visitors, receive medications, as well as to attend sick call, and take showers, Bucci says. Curtailed activities include classroom work, counseling sessions, recreation and trips to the prison library.

The budget lockdowns affect about 2736 inmates who are in the medium, maximum, and intake sections of the prison.

"It's been working extremely well," Bucci says, considering the disruption in the routines of not only inmates, but facility managers who have to operate with less staff. Corrections officers also miss out on overtime work.

Ninety-one high security prisoners are kept in their cells 23 hours a day anyway, and 711 minimum security prisoners are still being allowed to go work details, for which the prison system is reimbursed. Also unaffected is one section of the women's prison with 103 inmates.

Officials with the Rhode Island Brotherhood of Correctional Officers, which represents about 1200 workers who guard prisoners and have other ACI duties, could not be reached for comment at deadline. But one union official, who previously spoke on condition of anonymity, says the brotherhood is taking a wait-and-see approach to the new policy. The union doesn't object to the move as long as correctional officers are not endangered by having too few guards supervising too many prisoners, he says.

"If everyone is locked down per se, obviously that does not jeopardize safety and security," the union official says. "But if you reduce the staff and keep running operations, it does impact safety and security."

Bucci, the prison spokesman, would not say which days have been selected for the lockdowns, or how many have already been conducted.

Issue Date: October 11 - 17, 2002