HUNTSVILLE, Texas (KTRK) — Between carrying keys, a radio and wearing a thick uniform including a stab-proof vest, Jeff Ormsby said correction officers at state prisons are sweating.
“You’re looking at probably 10 extra pounds on you,” said Ormsby, executive director of the Texas Correctional Employees Council. “If you want to get a comparison to it, then put on a pair of blue jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, put on the heaviest down jacket you can find, and then go find you some stairs like at the Texas Memorial Stadium in Austin and run up and down the stairs every 30 minutes and you’ll get a good indication of what it’s like.”
13 Investigates found there’s an extra layer to why prison employees and inmates tell us they’re sweating inside Texas Department of Correctional Justice facilities.
A majority of state prisons in Texas have either partial or no air conditioning. At least 68 prison facilities house inmates in areas without air conditioning.
The state is required to keep an indoor heat log during the summer, which captures the temperature at 3 p.m. every day inside a cell or other housing areas without air conditioning.
Our investigation found temperatures reached as high as 106 degrees one day in June inside the housing area of a facility in Central Texas.
At the Garza West facility in South Texas, the indoor afternoon temperature exceeded 100 degrees, 11 days in a row in early August.
“I would say a large majority of officers that work for TDCJ are working in areas that have no AC access,” Ormsby said. “Inmates get what’s called respite. So if an inmate is getting too hot, they can request respite and they get to go down to the chapel or somewhere it’s air conditioned where they can cool down. Staff don’t have respite.”
Still, the families of incarcerated individuals tell us their loved ones inside state prisons routinely complain about the heat because while staff can go home at the end of the day to an air conditioned home, the prisoners can’t.
One of their complaints is that, in Texas, state jails are required to maintain temperatures between 65 and 85 degrees. There is no requirement for prisons to maintain a certain temperature.
Tonight on Eyewitness News after “Monday Night Football” on ABC13, 13 Investigates goes behind prison walls where brutal temperatures with little A/C relief are affecting dwindling staffing numbers and the chance of turning around inmates.
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