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Silver State Industries seeks training, pricing reviews and staffing adjustments amid retained-earnings pressure
Summary
Deputy director for industrial programs and Silver State Industries staff told legislators the program manages manufacturing and restoration shops across NDOC facilities, is reviewing product pricing and overhead, is pursuing new partnerships, and seeks limited one-time support to cover negative retained earnings after prior sweeps.
Bill Quenga, Deputy Director of Industrial Programs, and Silver State Industries staff described operations, training requests and staffing adjustments for the prison industries enterprise (budget account 3719), noting ongoing retained-earnings shortfalls and several operational initiatives.
Quenga reviewed shop operations (furniture, upholstery, metal fabrication, mattress production, printing, embroidery and other services) and said prison industries seeks out-of-state training and peer review (decision unit E300) and industry-specific conference attendance (E302) to assess machinery, operational trends and new revenue opportunities. Administrative Services Officer Jeff Doucette described requests for out‑of‑state travel, uniform cost increases and a one‑time allocation to address projected negative retained earnings.
Silver State Industries requested elimination of four vacant positions (a Lisonbee industry supervisor, a marketing coordinator and two correctional officers) and described efforts to re-evaluate overhead allocations and pricing. Quenga said prison industries conducts periodic pricing reviews and seeks to keep products competitive while avoiding pricing that would "price ourselves out" of the market. He said the operation attempts to keep vendors and purchases local where possible and is reviewing overhead such as utilities and facility costs that affect profitability.
Quenga and other witnesses described partnerships under negotiation—Sustainable Reform Solutions and Carson Trust were mentioned as potential partners, and discussions with private vendors and Northern Nevada development partners are ongoing. The program also highlighted its certified Prison Industries Enhancement (PIE) program, under which prevailing wage requirements apply for certain jobs: Quenga said PIE participants must be paid at least a defined prevailing rate for the SOC code and the program requires careful compliance with federal rules.
On inmate payroll and deductions, testimony said payroll and incoming funds are subject to ordered deductions in a fixed priority and are capped so that institutional or prison-industry payroll deductions do not exceed 50% of wages; the witnesses described a sequence of deductions (court filing fees, victim restitution, DOC sanctions, capital improvements, savings and victims-of-crime funds) that are applied in priority until the statutory or policy cap is reached. Quenga said his staff and NDOC inmate-banking staff apply those rules when processing payroll.
Ending: Quenga invited committee members to visit Silver State Industries operations and said the program will return follow-up information on which individual industry lines are operating at a loss and on efforts to increase contracted work and improve bids for state projects.
