PHOENIX — Public safety and law enforcement jobs have been a struggle to fill for years, demonstrating a problem that hasn't been limited to one geographic area in America.
In Arizona, however, one key sector has been significantly harder to staff than others: detention and corrections officers.
Sheriffs statewide say they hope one seemingly small change to the law could turn that around.
House Bill 2329 would restore a benefit for retirement for correctional and detention staff in the more than one dozen jails in the state.
Frank Beghin has been working at the Maricopa Co. Detention Center for more than 19 years, eventually moving up to the position as sergeant at the Downtown Phoenix jail.
"I always wanted to be in law enforcement," Beghin said.
After an experience in the field didn't work out in New York, Beghin says he found his right fit in Maricopa County. He's seen his facility operating at full capacity and staffing, but Beghin says for awhile now, their officers have felt the pinch of staffing shortages.
"Now, there's an officer in the housing units doing the job of pretty much two people," Beghin said.
Arizona sheriffs say a significant part of the hiring challenge in that sector comes back to a decision made in 2017, when detention and correction officers were moved into the Public Safety Personnel Retirement System, or PSPRS, which operates more or less as a 401(k), according to Maricopa Co. Sheriff Russ Skinner.
That decision took away the option for jail staff to get the pension that the vast majority of public safety workers nationwide have access to.
"The standard in the public safety industry is that pension. We have staff members in public safety that are dealing with very stressful, risky environments," Skinner said. "Our deputies get it, our law enforcement officers out on the street, our firefighters, even our dispatchers, probation. Unfortunately, corrections and detention officers are the ones that are left out."
The swap wasn't popular amongst staff either, including Beghin.
"25-year pension is a pretty good thing. I don't know why they took it away in the first place," he said.
The promise of a pension - and a defined service period of 20-25 years for public employees - was a big draw to the role, said Skinner, himself a 34-year veteran of MCSO. Skinner took on his role as sheriff of the nation's fourth largest county, by population, in mid-February.
Once the switch happened in 2017, officers in the county jails were locked into a plan that few wanted.
"In 2017, we had pretty close to full staffing in our detention facilities," Skinner said. "At this point in time, we're 780 detention officers vacant [in Maricopa County alone]."
Counties started struggling to hire without the draw of public service pensions, and they had a hard time retaining staff already in the jails. Skinner says since 2017, Maricopa County has hired over 800 people for detention and corrections roles. Only about 400 remain, and the majority of them are long-term officers who have been in the career for over five years.
Skinner said other factors that have come to light in recent years, including increased skepticism towards law enforcement, had also taken a toll on the hiring process, but attributed the largest challenge to the retirement plan switch.
Unlike other businesses with low staffing, jail staff can't simply close up shop and hope to make up their losses the next day. Public safety is put at risk when jails aren't staffed to capacity and officers are left working more hours, Skinner explains.
"The ripple effect is, yeah, we're gonna have vacancies. And what does that mean - how do we shrink [jail] population? We're not seeing a shrink in, you know, people committing crimes," Skinner added.
Now Skinner - and other sheriffs in the Copper State - are advocating for HB 2203, which they say would restore the pensions for jail staff, at what they say is a minimum financial impact to taxpayers. The bill would transfer jail employees into the Correctional Officers Retirement Plan, or CORP. Documents available on the Arizona House website do not lay out an exact figure in terms of financial impact, but supporters said the plan would be about a 2% increase in normal cost rate to the entity funding the retirement.
The bill awaits a vote in committee. In the meantime, just down the road from the Arizona House, staff like Beghin say they'll keep on showing up.
"We feel it here in the jail every day. If I don't have seven to ten officers working overtime every day, we're hurting bad," he said.
