PORTLAND, Ore. — Mike Reese, the director of the Oregon Department of Corrections, joined KGW's Straight Talk with Laural Porter this week to discuss his new role as the head of the state's prisons, the challenges he faces and his main priorities.
A former chief for the Portland Police Bureau and sheriff for the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office, Reese was appointed to his new role last fall by Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek. He now oversees 12 correctional institutions, 12,000 adults in custody, and more than 4,400 employees. He's in charge of the fourth largest agency in the state that carries a budget of $2.3 billion.
Reese takes over at a time when the department faces many challenges, including a staffing shortage, how to stop the flow of smuggled drugs into the prisons, and addressing problems cited in a state report at Oregon's only women's prison, Coffee Creek Correctional Center in Wilsonville. He joined Straight Talk this week to discuss how he plans to meet those challenges and about his goals as the head of Oregon's prison system.
Reese said he's focused on three things: employee wellness, reducing recidivism and addressing the prison systems' aging infrastructure and technology.
"First and foremost is our employee wellness," Reese said. "Making sure that our employees feel like they're supported and they have the tools and resources to be successful in their work with our adults in custody." He said the department must fill vacancies and provide more training for staff.
Reese said he wants to provide resources for adults in custody to help prepare them so they can thrive in the community when they leave prison.
"The second area that I really want to be of service in is to the adults in custody, making sure that they have the resources necessary so that when they leave our custody, which 95% of them do, we want to make sure that they're successful in re-entering our communities and that way, we reduce recidivism and we keep all of our communities safer," Reese said.
The third priority Reese mentioned is addressing aging infrastructure and technology. He said when he first started, he was surprised at what he found when he walked through the Oregon State Penitentiary, the state's second largest institution which houses about 2,000 adults in custody. It was built 100 years ago, he said, and there are five stories of housing units and no elevators.
"It's just an aging infrastructure that doesn't support the good work that we're trying to do with the adults in custody," he said.
He went on to say that the department's foundational technology, which was built in the 1980s, needs to be updated. "Think about computers from 1989," he said, "and that's what we're still using at the Department of Corrections to manage the data and information that we collect."
Reese discusses much more during the show, including how he plans to address the issues he outlined above.
Straight Talk" airs Saturday and Sunday at 6:30 p.m., and Monday at 7 p.m. "Straight Talk" is also available as a podcast.