The state needs to immediately transfer 1,000 offenders to private prisons to relieve stress on the Oklahoma Department of Corrections, a state lawmaker said.

“It is going to cost money to fix this,” Rep. Gus Blackwell, R-Laverne, said during a break in an interim study on the Department of Corrections.

 The agency was given a standstill budget for the current fiscal year, despite adding hundreds of additional inmates.

The agency has been plagued by staffing shortages and high turnover and is currently at capacity at state-run facilities, said Laura Pittman, a DOC deputy director.

Only 68.4 percent of all staff positions are filled, Pittman told members of a House subcommittee.

Rep. Jeff Hickman, R-Fairview, agreed with Blackwell’s assessment, but added that the state also needs to look at other alternatives to incarceration.

He said the state currently has two empty private prisons, one owned by GEO and the other by Corrections Corporation of America.

“We are at such crisis levels that I don’t think we have a choice,” Hickman said.

Correctional Officer Shaleen Day said her facility, Kate Barnard Community Corrections Center in Oklahoma City, is so short-staffed that contraband has been a problem, adding that there is no way to prevent it.

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