There has been a lot going on in the federal prison world as the new BOP administration attempts to address numerous organizational deficiencies that have festered for decades. In October, I offered my initial thoughts on the performance of BOP Director William Marshall (shown above) and Deputy Director Joshua Smith. But those were still early days, and it’s time for another look: 

The Good

Bold and decisive action is needed and some of the administration’s early efforts can be characterized as such. The rhetoric and optics are on point, provided Marshall and Smith consistently follow through with action. 

1. Smith has followed through on his commitment to visit many individual prisons personally, and we’re hearing that he usually talks to inmates as well as staff members. And while “listening campaigns” are ordinarily spin cycle events with minimal results, some of the on-site visits resulted in actions taken to address issues raised by the incarcerated people he talked to. For instance, some people whose transfer requests had been denied tell us that the deputy director intervened, and the decisions were reversed. Others tell us that Smith gave them waivers that allowed them to receive FSA credits, despite their medium recidivism risk. Still others said that after Smith intervened, they received longer pre-release (halfway house) placements. 
   
2. After President Trump’s allocation of $4 billion to address the massive infrastructure maintenance backlog across the system, Deputy Director Smith acted by centralizing about 2,000 facility staff members across the system under his supervision and holding an “industry day” earlier this year, which private sector experts heard from BOP employees about the agency’s most pressing needs. In addition, more inmates are being trained and certified as electricians etc., then paid at rates competitive with UNICOR jobs
   
3. There also appears to be more of a focus on rehabilitation, programs and specifically the involvement of justice-involved people.  For example, Deputy Director Smith has invited two formerly incarcerated authors and self-improvement speakers to address inmates across the prison system: Michael Santos of Prison Professors and Damon West.
   
4. On a related note, Smith has said that inmates across federal prison will be provided tablets that can be used for both family communication and educational programming. We are waiting to see when that happens and what is actually offered.
   
5. It is also a very positive sign to see the BOP host an industry day for manufacturers of body-worn camera technologies. As the BOP reported on its website:  Participating vendors will demonstrate their solutions and discuss potential applications that support the Bureau’s goals, including improved documentation of staff actions…” And in a media interview, Marshall said, “I think [bodycams] could be absolute game changer when it comes to making sure our officers are doing the right thing.” PERA has strongly advocated for the use of bodycams for correctional officers. They are particularly needed in the more dysfunctional institutions with staff cultures that promote inhumane treatment and civil rights violations.
   
6. I have long bemoaned the dozens of BOP policies that are out of date or not available on the bureau’s website at all. Finally, Director Marshall is prioritizing these core documents and has updated and issued 30 of them. the recent issuance of over 30 program statements was positive, although we haven’t yet done a deep dive into the specifics of the update. Now, the BOP must figure out a way to assure that staff follow those policies. 

The Bad

However, there are some disappointments as well. There has been little action on the “low hanging fruit” we previously wrote about, such as reducing the cultural barriers to unimpeded communication between inmates and their lawyers, systemic administrative remedy obstruction by staff, and inconsistency in lockdown and MAT practices. 

1. If the director made legal communication a priority by issuing specific written guidance to the field, that issue could be corrected overnight.  Instead, the frequency of frustrated legal communication has increased. That is simply unacceptable …and correctable.
   
2. Likewise, allowing inmates to initiate administrative remedies over the Trulincs system via an electronic cop out would go a long way to expediting the process and allowing progress to be tracked.  In addition, making remedy forms available to inmates without counselors acting as gatekeepers would alleviate the frustration of the population and foster better staff-inmate communication. 
   
3. And finally, criteria are haphazard or missing altogether for full and modified facility lockdowns, as well as the implementation of MAT. For the former, a policy is needed that spells out when and how they should be implemented. And for the latter, financial constraints should not decide who receives treatment for their addiction or which treatment they receive. After practically forcing people to accept injections due to the rampant diversion of Suboxone, the agency reversed course due to the cost of the injections and switched nearly everyone to the strips. The result: Diversion is alive and well. In the summer of last year, the BOP removed from its website the clinical treatment guidelines for MAT, titled “Opioid Use Disorder: Diagnosis, Evaluation and Treatment” (dated August 2021). It only recently posted a new document, which fails to spell out guidance governing implementation within the BOP. 

The Ugly

1. Case manager training and responsiveness is horrendous and unacceptable. It amazes me how little today’s case managers know and the indifference they display toward inmates who looking for answers. One of the most frequent complaints we hear from prisoners continues to be the lack of access to staff and the indifference they experience when they finally get to interact. For example, unit managers are not attending team meetings as required in BOP policy. As a result, unit team meetings, which are the most important element of unit management, are superficial and broken. For example, unit managers do not attend team meetings and team meetings aren’t held as intended. Instead of organizing the required meetings, staff often just slide a paper under an inmate’s cell door. This is counterproductive to rehabilitation and negatively impacts facility safety. 
   
2. Likewise, both medical and mental health care are systemically inadequate, in part because staffing shortages continue. Look no further than the recent letter to the BOP from the House Committee on the Judiciary and a document obtained via a recent FOIA request (and posted on our website) documenting extensive medical and psychology staff vacancies (10 psychologists at USP Leavenworth, for example!). We recently zoomed with a former BOP psychologist who resigned earlier this year who told us the entire complex he worked at was down to four psychologists. His resignation was due to the stress associated with being unable to fulfill his clinical responsibilities, as well as pressure to falsify clinical treatment notes to maintain program review compliance. It’s easy for regional and central staff who work in the “crystal palaces,” some of whom have never worked in a prison, to apply such pressure. We also just received a report that FMC Devens has no permanent doctor on staff and is rotating in professionals from other facilities to cover their responsibilities. This may sound dramatic, but these are life-and-death issues that deserve more priority. 
   
3. The administration’s response to these shortages has, in part, been a downgrading of medical and psychological care levels. Meanwhile, the 2019 clinical directive on medical and psychological care levels remained on the website until it was finally replaced with a new version in October (and not posted on the BOP’s website until March!). That is the opposite of transparency. 
   
4. Like it or hate it, the termination of the BOP’s collective bargaining agreement with the employee union early in the administration has caused an internal revolt; I’m hearing terms like “quiet quitting,” and the most popular comment we hear from line staff regarding the administration is that it is a dumpster fire. Rank-and-file employees are the backbone of the agency; when you lose them, you lose the agency. 

It is still early days for this new administration, given the enormity of the problems facing the BOP.  The optics are good and some substantive action has occurred. But in the end, we will judge the administration when the repeated complaints of civil rights violations decrease significantly.