A group of corrections officers from the state-run Adirondack Correctional prison in Ray Brook strike outside the facility on Friday in the cold. The striking workers did not want their faces photographed, for fear of retribution. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

RAY BROOK — After a week and a half of corrections officers at Adirondack Correctional being on an unsanctioned strike, along with COs at state prisons around New York, the state and the CO’s union have reached a potential agreement on compromises for a new contract in an attempt to end the strike — but local officers say they’re staying out in the cold, risking fines, termination or arrest.

“They reached (an agreement), we didn’t,” one said on Friday.

Under the agreement, the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision would not discipline striking employees if they return to work by their shift today. They still could be fined under the Taylor Law, which requires union permission for public employees to strike. But COs standing outside the medium security state prison in Ray Brook on Friday said they’re not going back until their demands are met.

“The leadership of our union has not negotiated in good faith on our behalf,” one said. “It’s up to the members. A union is a group of members.”

They said they’ve lost faith in their union leaders’ ability to negotiate for them.

“Who’s the union? Aren’t we the union?” another said, gesturing at the crowd gathered around burn barrels. “They represent us. We’re telling them we’re striking. They don’t have our back. What’s that say about the union?”

None of the striking COs wanted to speak to the paper on the record with their names, fearing retribution. The Enterprise was able to speak with several of them on the condition of anonymity.

The agreement would only become active once the strikes are ended. Attorney Martin Scheinman, who mediated the agreement, said court enforcement of the agreement would be “impossible” due to the number of striking officers and said he would not issue an agreement he believes would be unenforceable judicially.

The New York State Correctional Officers and Police Benevolent Association union is encouraging its members to return to work.

“It will be up to each individual who currently is refusing to work to decide whether to return to work or risk termination, potential fines and possible arrest for violating the court order,” NYSCOPBA spokesman James Miller wrote in an email.

The agreement would be a court order. A state Supreme Court justice has already issued restraining orders against the striking officers for the illegal “wildcat” strike. Employees violating the Taylor Law have their pay deducted up to twice their daily pay rate for every day they’re on strike. Over the weekend, State Police troopers served orders against officers by mail, email and at their homes, saying they could be arrested for contempt of court.

“Do you think we’re doing this for nothing?” one Adirondack Correctional CO said on Friday, mentioning the potential consequences of the strike and the negative-degree temperatures they’ve been outside in for several days during the strike.

It’s been “tough” but they say “sacrifices have to be made” to get the changes they want. COs at Adirondack Correctional said they’re hearing similar sentiments from striking officers at prisons around the state.

The tentative agreement was mediated by Scheinman of Scheinman Arbitration and Mediation Services. He was mutually selected DOCCS by and NYSCOPBA.

“What has become clear during the mediation is the relationship between the parties and the workforce is strained,” Scheinman wrote in a news release. “No single issue, law, or policy entirely explains the current situation. It is obvious this erosion did not happen all at once.”

Gov. Kathy Hochul has deployed the state National Guard to the prisons to maintain safety during the strikes. The agreement says they’ll be there until the governor lets them go.

On Friday, COs at Adirondack Correctional said more of their co-workers have joined them in the strike.

“It’s awesome to see them,” one said.

They say well more than half of the staff there are participating in the walkout.

They again thanked the community for their support — keeping them fed and supplied with coffee and encouragement.

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What’s in the agreement?

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The only part of the agreement that COs on Friday said they liked is the requirement that DOCCS contract with a vendor to provide equipment and services to screen legal mail to inmates for contraband, and that NYSCOPBA will have a voice in the selection. But COs felt that’s not a real guarantee that things will change.

This skepticism was echoed by Scheinman’s account of the multi-day deliberations.

“Simply stated, anyone observing these meetings would readily observe the parties’ good faith and enormous commitment to finding workable solutions for the workforce,” he wrote. “Yet, the parties are concerned that promises will not be kept.”

The tentative agreement has several contract amendments — but the main ones are attempts to limit the amount of mandated overtime in a pay period and the ability to temporarily suspend elements of the HALT Act at a local level during periods of low staffing.

The Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act was signed into law in March 2022.

The HALT law changed the length and reasons an inmate could be put in solitary confinement, stating that long-term solitary confinement is torture. Previously, solitary confinement could be used from up to 23 hours a day over many consecutive days, months or years. HALT reduced the length of time and violations that it could be used in. Under the act, holding an inmate in any cell for more than 17 hours a day is generally limited to 15 consecutive days, or 20 days in any 60-day period. There are exceptions for violations rising to a level making it necessary, which requires an evidentiary hearing.

COs say the HALT Act has increased violence in prisons, pointing to statistics that assaults on officers have risen by 76% since it was adopted. They are calling for a complete repeal of HALT. Inmate advocacy groups point to state reviews of the HALT Act, showing it has not been fully implemented. They are calling for the act to be fully implemented.

The agreement would allow for the current suspension of HALT’s programming elements to continue for 90 days from when it is signed. Under HALT, people held in solitary confinement must be offered at least four hours of out-of-cell programming a day, including one hour of recreation.

Under the agreement, after 30 days, the DOCCS Commissioner would consider whether to reinstate these suspended HALT elements on a facility-by-facility basis by evaluating each prison’s safety and security.

The agreement implements a “circuit breaker” staffing metric where, after HALT elements are reinstated, facilities would have the ability to temporarily suspend them on “high impact days” to avoid 24-hour mandatory overtimes — one of the striking COs major concerns.

High impact days are days when there is less staff available — typically Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Under this rule, if staffing vacancies are 30% or higher, the facility could suspend the HALT provisions like it is doing now, close posts and suspend programming for the general population. The DOCCS commissioner can set other high impact days, too.

“The joint goal is to minimize and work towards eliminating anyone working 24-hour mandatory overtime,” the agreement says.

Every mandated 24-hour shift will automatically be reviewed by the local union and superintendent to understand the reasons for it and submitted to NYSCOPBA and the state to discuss corrective action.

It also includes changes to overtime.

If an officer volunteers to work four eight-hour overtime shifts in a two-week pay period, they will not be mandated to work an additional shift in that period. If they are mandated a fifth overtime shift in that period to meet staffing requirements, they will get an overtime shift credit on the next pay period and only need three overtime shifts to hit the cap.

If an officer is mandated to work a third overtime shift in one week, they’ll be paid a $750 penalty from DOCCS for violating the agreement.

Volunteering to work on weekend high impact days comes with an additional $100 per shift.

But COs at Adirondack Correctional said this cap is twice as much overtime as their currently mandated one overtime shift a week. Under the agreement, they could take two voluntary overtimes in a week and still have the chance of a “stick” — a mandated and unscheduled overtime shift.

“They doubled down on what we were trying to change,” one CO said on Friday.

The agreement also says National Guard troops can be used to prevent 24-hour overtime shifts. The agreement says the state could rehire retired COs as temporary hourly officers to do transportation when the voluntary overtime list is exhausted. However, if retirees are not available, they’d require mandatory overtime.

The agreement says DOCCS will set up a committee to analyze staffing and inefficiencies at each facility.

The agreement has some of the pay demands requested. Within four months, DOCCS would increase salaries for COs and sergeants by around $10,000. The current hiring salary for COs is $53,764 and the current hiring salary for sergeants is $63,361.

“Sure, everybody wants more money. But, realistically, we’re paid pretty well. We want safety,” one Adirondack Correctional CO said Friday.

They added that they’re asking for safety for themselves, for the inmates and for the civilian staff inside.

According to DOCCS, 43 COs have died on the job since 1861. The last death was in 2011. COs are worried they’ll be the next one.

DOCCS data shows that, statewide, in 2024, there were 2,070 assaults on staff. Data going back to 2018 shows staff assaults were around or below 1,000 from 2018 to 2022, rising slightly before 2022 and then increasing more sharply until today. Assaults on inmates have followed a similar track, increasing even more sharply in 2023. So far in 2025, there have been more than 160 recorded assaults on staff, mostly at maximum security facilities. The vast majority of reported assaults result in no injury, with a handful rising to the level of severe injury.

Inmate advocacy groups don’t like the agreement either.

Jerome Wright, co-director of the #HALTsolitary campaign, said DOCCS does not have the authority to suspend HALT.

“Today’s illegal agreement aims to maintain a racist regime of torture, brutality and death,” he said in a statement. “Let’s be clear that they are simply violating the law and people will be tortured and die as a result.”

On Wednesday, two inmates at the downstate Sing Sing Correctional Facility died in solitary confinement cells — one by suspected suicide and the other with unknown cause.

To read more about the last week-and-a-half of the strike, go to tinyurl.com/6adw7wm2 and tinyurl.com/38cfkjhk.