By RAELYNN RICARTE
News staff writer
February 25, 2008

Officials at the regional jail will know within two weeks whether any criminal offenses have been committed by employees and/or managers.

The results of an internal review at the Northern Oregon Regional Correctional Facilities (NORCOR) were turned over to Wasco County District Attorney Eric Nisley last week.

The prosecutor is now tasked with sifting through the documents to discern if any criminal offenses have been committed at the facility in The Dalles. Hood River County Chief Deputy Jerry Brown spent about 250 hours talking with 60 staffers during the fall and winter months. He was assisted by Sherman County Sgt. Randy Studebaker and Gilliam County Deputy John Terrel.

“Our work is now over. Whether or not he (Nisely) finds grounds for an investigation remains to be seen,” said interim Administrator Laura Pryor at Thursday’s board meeting.

The NORCOR board; comprised of elected officials from Hood River, Wasco, Sherman and Gilliam counties; concurred that disciplinary actions were likely to arise from Nisely’s report.

“I think it’s important that we keep this process moving along and get things taken care of as quickly as possible,” said Hood River County Commissioner Ron Rivers.

Last year he insisted upon a review of the jail’s work environment. When Rivers accepted a seat on the NORCOR board in January of 2007, he received a spate of complaints from employees. These individuals alleged money mismanagement, sexual harassment, retaliation for reporting wrongdoing, gender discrimination and the assault of some inmates.

“I think, from my point of view, there are internal structures here that are not functioning very well. And I think that could happen when you’ve been out of sync with administrators coming and going for a long period of time,” said Pryor.

The former Gilliam County judge was brought on board in December to fix problems at NORCOR before a permanent administrator takes over. The jail has functioned without a chief since Paul Barnett retired at the end of 2005. Capt. Larry Lindhorst juggled some of those duties until last spring when retired Wasco County Sheriff Darrell Hill agreed to step in and resolve some of the issues raised by employees.

Workers initially expressed satisfaction with Hall’s intervention, but raised a new flurry of protests after Lindhorst was promoted in August to the administrative position. The captain and other supervisors had been named as perpetrators of wrongdoing in earlier complaints.

Rivers was contacted by 10 employees with new information after he objected to the hiring of Lindhorst. He requested the NORCOR board take a deeper look into the situation and the sheriff’s advisory board assumed that duty.

On Thursday, Pryor said numerous grievances were still pending against NORCOR practices. She said a staffer’s complaint had also been registered with the Bureau of Labor and Industries and another worker was threatening legal action. That individual claims to have been targeted for abuse after reporting the sexual harassment of female juvenile inmates and co-workers.

Despite having to deal with major personnel problems, Rivers and Pryor remain optimistic that life at NORCOR will soon settle into a predictable routine. They estimate it will take the remainder of 2008 to get all of the outstanding issues resolved.

“We’re getting there, it’s just going to take awhile to deal with something that’s gotten this far out of control,” said Rivers in a follow-up comment about Thursday’s meeting.

He and other board members interviewed the three top candidates for the administrator job this week. The position given to Lindhorst was re-advertised when NORCOR officials learned that he had been hired in an illegal meeting.

Two of the current finalists reside in Arizona and one in Oklahoma. The individual chosen as the top choice by three interview panels is expected to be offered the position by early March. He or she will have to undergo a psychological evaluation and a criminal background check.

With a little over a month remaining on her contract, Pryor has now focused her attention on the “chaos with payroll.” She gained permission from the NORCOR board on Feb. 21 to hire an accountant from The Dalles to help deal with an array of budget issues.

Patricia Kaseberg will be paid $95 per hour to help set a uniform policy for overtime and the computation of hours. In addition, she is being asked to set up a replacement fund for vehicles, computer stations, software and other equipment.

“I’m trying to get each one of the internal systems in place so the new person walks into some sort of structure,” said Pryor.

She said policies and procedures set up after NORCOR opened its doors in 1999 need to be upgraded. She said new state and federal rules are constantly being put into play and one of the primary duties of the new administrator will be to make sure these are properly enacted.

She believes some of the budget confusion at NORCOR has arisen from treating the juvenile and adult wings as two separate entities. Pryor said these operations should be seen as two departments within a single agency and their financial situation dealt with accordingly.

“My goal is to walk out of here with a framework in place that the employees and the counties that fund NORCOR can rely on,” said Pryor.

In other business, the board elected these new officers: Sherman County Commissioner Steve Burnet, chair, Gilliam County Commissioner Frank Bettencourt, vice-chair and Rivers, secretary/treasurer. Gilliam County Sheriff Gary Bettencourt will serve as the sheriff’s board representative.