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Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Ind. Gov't. - Breaking News: Buss out as Florida Corrections Head

From a just-issued press release by Florida Governor Rick Scott:
Tallahassee, Fla – Governor Rick Scott announced today that he has accepted the resignation of Edwin G. Buss as Secretary of Florida’s Department of Corrections. Buss will be replaced by Deputy Commissioner of the Florida Department of Law Enforcement Ken Tucker. * * *

Regarding Buss, Governor Scott said differences in philosophy and management styles arose which made the separation in the best interests of the state. The Governor appreciates Secretary Buss’s service to the state and wishes him well in his new endeavors.

How long was he there?

See this story from Dec. 28, 2010, headed "Governor-Elect Rick Scott taps Edwin G. Buss to run Dept. of Corrections." And this interesting story from the Jan. 25, 2011 Corrections Reporter, where you will find that when Buss started this year, the "Florida Department of Corrections [had already] had two secretaries in the past four years."

Within the past few weeks, these stories have appeared in the Florida papers:

"New state prison boss pushing big changes" - this long July 30th story by St. Petersburg Times columnist Steve Bousquet builds speed the further you read, until, near the end:

Buss soon hired a health care policy adviser, Elizabeth "Betty" Gondles, who also worked for him in Indiana, for a 10-month contract at $180,000. Gondles is overseeing the selection of a private vendor to handle all of the prison system's health care.

He banned smoking in prisons, effective this coming September. The other day Buss issued an edict banning pornography in all prisons, after he saw a Playboy centerfold tacked to a wall in a South Florida prison.

He wants correctional officers to work 12-hour shifts, not eight-hour ones, and when the guards union balked, the two sides agreed to a compromise: a pilot program at Jefferson Correctional Institution in Monticello.

"Gov. Scott's office pulls plug on MSNBC's 'Lockup' taping in Florida prison," from the Aug. 19th Bradenton.com.

"Prisons chief replaces top-level staff: Edwin Buss, Florida’s new corrections department chief, has hired more than a dozen people from his former state of Indiana," from the August 23rd issue of the Miami Herald. The long story includes a sidebar listing the former Indiana employees and their Florida salaries. It also includes this quote near the end:

Under Buss’ direction, the notoriously insular prison system has become an incubator of new ideas from special prison dorms for veterans to more educational and re-entry efforts to reduce the chance that inmates will return to prison.

Two setbacks

But Buss’ zeal to improve the system has hit two hurdles in the past week, suggesting growing tension between Buss and the governor’s office.

Scott’s staff questioned Buss’ decision to sign a deal with MSNBC to tape six episodes of its Lockup series at Santa Rosa Correctional Institution in Milton and ordered the contract scrapped. The network would have paid the state $110,000, and the prison system would have had final say on which scenes were used.

The Governor’s Office also ordered changes to a bid proposal to privatize all prison healthcare services. The bid specified that a vendor must be accredited by the American Correctional Association.

The bid’s author, healthcare consultant Betty Gondles — who also did work for Buss in Indiana — is the wife of ACA executive director James Gondles. Gondles was hired on a 10-month contract for $180,000.

Posted by Marcia Oddi on August 24, 2011 07:39 PM
Posted to Indiana Government