Subcommittee will come to order without objection declare recess at any time. We welcome everyone to todays hearing on the federal bureau of prisons. I ask our friend florida ms. Lee to lead us for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flagr which it stands, one nation under god and indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Thank you, ms. Lee. Without objection the gentleman from maryland mr. Ivy will be able to participate for the purpose of questioning the witness if the gentleman yields him time for that purpose, i see no objection. I now recognize myself for an Opening Statement. I thank director peters for coming today and the audience, we appreciate you being here. This hearing is oversight of the bureau of prisons. The federal bureau of prisons is component of the department of justice. Bop to protect society in confining offenders in controlled environments of prisons and communitybased facilities that are safe, humane, cost efficient and properly secured and bop provides selfimprovement opportunities to assist offenders in becoming law abiding citizens. At the time of rising crime this is a critically important function. Bop operates 102 institutions throughout the nation. These are operated at 5 different security levels in order to confine offenders in an appropriate manner. As of last week, bop is responsible for the custody and care of more than 158,000 inmates and employees more than 34,000 individuals. Nearly 5 years ago President Trump signed the First Step Act in 2018 to reduce the size of the federal prison population recidivism while maintaining Public Safety. Two sentencing reform and three reauthorization of the Second Chance act of 2007. Bop is charged with much of the implementation of First Step Act. As mentioned earlier we are experiencing nationwide spike in crime and vital that bop gets implementation right. To assign prisoners to evidencebase recidivism programs. The programs include literacy programs, occupational programs, trade School Programs and Substance Use programs. Inmates can receive additional time credits which allows them to be placed in home confine meant or rrc than earlier would have been. Thats why bop needs to make sure they get it right. We cannot allow criminal leaving our prison early unless we can assure they will not reoffend. We are continuing that conversation today however, theres a larger underlying issue persistently plagued bop and the implementation of the First Step Act. Bop consistently grapples low staffing and high atrigs rates intensifying risk in already hazardous profession. Thats 5 decline from the 37,000 employed in 2020. Yet the prison inmate population has not declined, in fact, increased by 3,000 as of last month more than 20 of the 20,446 congressionally authorized correction officer positions remained vacant, more than 2 years ago gao published a study identifying several underlying causes for the staffing challenges. G a, o analysis highlighted that bop had not been proficient in accurately assessing or providing documentations for staffing deficits. Gao identified that bop resort today amplifying the the overtime hours of personnel to mitigate Staffing Shortages as a result accumulative overtime hours surged by 102 between 2015 and 2019. This escalation and overtime imposed significant stress in the bop workforce, consequently these actions amplified the safety vulnerabilities for remaining personnel and inadvertently extend the wait times for inmates to excuse me, access basic services. I know that director peters is is acutely aware of this persistent problem and i look forward from hearing her today on the steps that bop is taking to address the Staffing Shortage and other issues at the bureau. I appreciate you being here director, i look forward hearing from you and i yield back. Ms. Jackson lee, the Ranking Member is absent today and ms. Mcbeth is stepping in in her place and i recognize her as the Ranking Member for an Opening Statement. Thank you, chairman, and regretfully as you expressed Ranking Member jackson lee is unable to attend todays hearing however she tells me that she had a good productive meeting with director peters yesterday and pledges continue support of bop and its mission. In our first year with the federal bureau of prisons director peters have taken noteworthy steps to improve culture and management of the agency and increase accountability and transparency. She has rooted out employee misconduct and and and neglect of inmates, addressing staffing deficits at bop facilities and implementation of First Step Act. As i have said before, ins cars rated americans should not fear death when they enter our federal prison system. Correctional officers should not fear for their safety at work. We as members of congress have a duty to the inmates that are housed in our bops facilities. The communities that they will eventually return to and the nearly 40,000 employees in the bop 40,000 employees in 122bop institutions across the country. That is why i joined with representative Kelly Armstrong along senators dick durbin and mike braun to introduce the federal prison overact following tenmonth investigation into corruption, abuse and misconduct at u. S. Pentrary atlanta where i represent georgia and the entirety of bop. Across the country there are numerous cases involving misconduct of bop employees, ranging from theft of government property, obstruction of justice and sexually abusing prisoners. These cases do not provide a full picture of employee misconduct at bop. According to the agencys annual office of internal Affairs Report investigators overred 14,361 cases alleges misconduct by staggering 17,907 employees. The most recent fiscal year when misconduct allegations were lodged against almost one of every 5bop employees the charge was deemed sustained nearly 30 of the time. The majority received nothing more than a written reprimand or suspension and about one in every 25 cases no action was taken at all. While it is important to identify and hold bad apples responsible. It is doubly important to put in place measure that is will dedefuture employees and discourage coverups. We know that the problem facing bop have existed for quite some time and change will not happen overnight but there are dangerous conditions which still exist today that threaten the safety of inmates and staff and require our immediate attention. Just two months ago whistleblower claimed that staff are covering serious misconduct that includes releasing the wrong inmates physically and verbally abusing inmates and using racial slurs attempting to coverrish mate and misusing restrictive housing such behavior is unacceptable and cannot continue. By adding an additional independent layer of oversight the bipartisan federal prison oversight act would strengthen our federal prison system bolster Public Safety and provide a mechanism for incarcerated individuals and their loved ones to protect their civil and human rights. Last year Sheila Jackson lee visit beaumont, texas. Staff were overworked and underpaid and the staff at hazelton agree. They reported chronic understaff in resulting in massive amounts of mandated overtime as well as reliance on medical staff and counselors to fill in as Correctional Officers. Staff at uspi atlanta and fci experiencing similar staffing issues report that fatigue exhaustion and low morale have reduced staff productivity and led to more sick leave, retirements, resignations and staff leaving to other agencies for better pay. Since Ranking Member jackson lees visit director peters has deployed various strategies to recruit and retain staff by securing and providing retention incentive bonuses at certain facilities and changing the marketing messaging. I am encouraged by conversation that i had with her just recently where she explained that the bops turnover rate has decreased by 20 . Staffing is at 70 for Correctional Officers, the agency is at 90 overall staffing and 1098 out of 200 positions for reentry coordinators have been filled. In addition to staffing challenges increasing number of facilities and supporting infrastructure have reached or exceeded their usable their useful life such as usp atlanta which is one of the oldest bop facilities in the country, so far director peters and her team have identified a 2 billiondollar deficit around the facility that is prioritizes only those repairs and improvements that address risk to life and safety. To be clear, director peters has made great progress during her short term at bop and she should be applauded for that, not only has she taken steps to better care for bop staff, she has also prioritized humanizing conditions for prison population. In our recent conversation director peters shared that bop is collaborating with the National Institute of justice to improve the use of restrictive housing while bop staffers are surveying various states to determine best practices which should please many of us. I am sure that like me, Ranking Member jackson lee would wand to know when we can see a change in bops use of restrictive housing since recent statistics show that bop is utilized in this practice more now than in the press decade. Theres still so much work to be done at bop, an agency that is a critical component of overall safety of the country. The agency has a responsibility to focus on each of the Critical Issues it faces to carry out the ideals of justice and accountability while promoting successful rehabilitation and maintaining the custody and control of incarcerated prisoners and persons in a humane and safe manner, in sum, bop must fully carry out every aspect of its mission and Congress Must ensure bop has the tools and funding that it needs to do so. Thank you for being here today, director peters, i look forward to our discussion and ask mr. Chairman for unanimous consent enter into statement. Without objection. The gentle lady yields back. Without objection all other Opening Statements will be included in the record. I will now introduce todays witness, ms. Peters. Director of federal of prison, sworn by attorney general on august 2nd, 2022. She oversees 122 bureau of prison facilities, 6 Regional Offices, two staff Training Centers and reentry management offices. We welcome our witness today and thank her for appearing and now we will begin by swearing in director if you would please rise and raise your right hand. Do you swear or affirm under penalty of perjury the testimony that youre about to give is true and correct to the best of your knowledge and information and believe so help you god . I do. Let the record reflect that the witness has answered in the affirmative. Again, i want you to know your written testimony has been entered into the record in its entirety accordingly we will ask you to limit your opening remarks to 5 minutes, youll see yellow light and a red light and after that i will kind of waive at you and tap on the thing just to remind you to wrap up but were looking forward hearing from you and with that, ms. Peters, youre recognized for your 5minute Opening Statement. Thank you, mr. Chair. Good morning chairman biggs, Ranking Member jackson lee is not here, thank you, congressman mcbath and members to have subcommittee. I am honor today appear before you today to discuss the important and impactful work happening at the federal bureau of prisons. Since i was sworn in last august i visited more than 25 of our institutions and these are my best days. It is a privilege to meet our corrections professionals while walking the halls of our institutions, they truly are my inspiration and i am grateful for their dedication. It is with their important work in mind that we engage in Strategic Planning and modernized our mission, our vision guided by the principles of normalcy and humanity and core values that emphasize accountability, integrity, respect, compassion and correctional excellence. We engage in proactive outreach to members of congress, members of the media, advocacy organizations and justice involved individuals while maintaining a very collaborative relationship with our national union. This Strategic Vision along with clear expectations has put us on a course for success. The vast majority of our employees are hard working, ethical corrections professionals who expect that those who are engaged in this conduct be held accountable. We added substantial resources in this last year to office of internal affairs. We collaborated with our Law Enforcement partners to the investigate criminal misconduct and held individuals accountable up to an including termination and prosecution. I have communicated clear expectations that misconduct and retaliation will not be tolerated. I also want to address restrictive housing because despite our efforts over the last few years to drive the numbers down, we have seen them increase. While i am glad to report they have started to decrease in the last couple of months, we have much more work to do. It can increase an individuals future criminality. So we created a shortterm plan and longterm plan. First, we formed a work group comprising of executive team who have traveled across the country to review best practices from other correctional systems around country and around the globe. Longterm we entered into a Historic Partnership with the National Institution of justice and they are going to bring an exterior organization of experts in to provide recommendations the success of reforms will rely on work of correctional professionals and we need more of them. So we have been working diligently on our recruitment and retention crisis. Since the beginning of this year we have seen a 60 increase in new hires and 20 decrease of individuals leaving our organization. We had 86 rates and today we have filled 90 yet we are still not where we need to be and until we solve the problem we must continue to be concerned about Employee Wellness and need to rely on augmentation and overtime. Another major issue is maintenance and repair backlog, healthy facility structures are critical to operations and yet we have 2 billiondollar maintenance and repair backlog which only accounts for the most serious categories, safety and life categories. We are contracting again with an external organization to come in and assess our overall problem. Now inside these structures we are the defacto Mental Health hospital, the largest provider of alcohol and drug treatment and we have nearly 160,000 patients, many of whom come to us with very complex issues and chronic disease. With these complexities we must ensure that we operate holistically as a Healthcare Organization and we have contracted with an external entity to provide on Correctional Health best practices and implementing normalcy and humanity. We remain committed to firststep acts implementation roughly 104,000 individuals are participating today in over 110evidence based programs and productive activities and more than 25,000 have been released through the application of earned time credits. As ive said many times, i believe in accountability oversight and transparency and i know we cannot do this work alone. So mr. Chairman, and members of the subcommittee im honored to speak with you on behalf of our dedicated employees across the country, this concludes my Opening Statement and i look forward to your questions. Thank you, director, we appreciate that and now i recognize the gentleman from florida mr. Gaetz. I have hardened by your discussions of visits to get firsthand understanding of whats going on there. Sometimes congress have had challenges doing that. Could you give us advice if we wanted to glean those benefits, whats the best way to go about that with your team . Thank you, congressman. If you have your team reach out to our office of legislative affairs we will be happy to make that arrackment. Thank you. Ts. I have been clear that retaliation would not be stood for on my watch. And youre confident that thats being observed throughout the bureau . Im confident the message is delivered and if anyone engages in retaliation we will hold them accountable. Are you familiar with john strand . That name is not familiar to me, no. He was convicted, sentenced at fci miami and i had received word that he had been placed into enhanced confinement and into higher acuity securing as consequence of information that others had put out on his twitter feed. So that something does that ring a bell to you . Congressman, i wouldnt be able to speak to an individuals circumstances regarding their behavior inside our institutions, what i can assure you if an individual is placed in our special Housing Units it would be for conduct that happened inside the institution. So whats a special housing unit . Special using unit is one of our restrictive housing placements that could include segregation, protective custody and with housed individuals that either were at harm to harm themselves or others or had actually engaged in misbehavior inside our institutions. What im word about is mr. Strand gave us testimony about some of his concerns and as you know people give us testimony and we sort through whats right and wrong and what should be acted on and not acted on. Its not gospel, its just testimony but then thereafter people were posting on social media forms about treatment he received tat bureau and i sent a letter to you