Vermont DOC’s 2‑2‑3 Shift Plan Gains New Recruits but Sparks Worker Complaints Over Overtime and Implementation

The Joint Legislative Justice Oversight Committee on Sept. 18 heard competing accounts about a statewide move to a 2‑2‑3 schedule of twelve‑hour shifts for correctional officers, a change DOC officials say is stabilizing staffing but that unions and some officers say has been implemented unevenly and has left many staff working lengthy mandatory overtime.

Commissioner Nick Della, who said he became DOC commissioner about three years ago, told the committee the department moved to the 2‑2‑3 rotation after emergency twelve‑hour shifts introduced during Covid‑era staffing shortages proved preferable to staff and lowered required FTEs on continuous posts. “We’ve actually injected close to $30,000,000 in the last 2 and a half years,” Della said, describing investments in pay plans and other retention measures alongside the scheduling change.

Why it matters: DOC officials argued the schedule gives staff more predictable time off and helps recruit newer employees who want weekend and family time, while union leaders and some frontline officers said the schedule’s benefits have not been realized where daily available staff are too few. The dispute centers on whether vote triggers used to adopt the schedule counted filled positions or the number of staff actually available on a given day.

Vermont State Employees Association Executive Director Steve Howard told legislators the union collected frontline statements alleging inhumane conditions and family strain. He said some facilities were moved onto the new schedule even though they lacked the daily 'bodies on the floor' needed to sustain it, creating repeated holdovers and large amounts of overtime. “We are destroying their lives,” Howard said, summarizing members’ testimony.

Multiple officers who testified gave divergent views. Jeff Reynolds, a CO at Northeast Correctional Complex, said the twelves restored consistency and family time after years of irregular eight‑hour rotations that produced repeated sixteen‑hour holdovers. “This schedule gives us a life,” he said. By contrast, CO‑1 Shawanda Hill described conditions where staff and residents suffered during long shifts and frequent lockdowns; she told the committee she had seen coworkers fall unconscious from heat and exhaustion.

DOC representatives said the schedule was implemented site‑by‑site after staffing analyses, that CO‑1 and CO‑2 ranks voted at their sites, and that supervisors and frontline staff participated in developing schedules. Travis Dedz, the facilities division director, described a two‑threshold approach that required a facility to reach a staffing 'striking distance' before prompting a vote.

Numbers cited to the committee provide context for the argument: DOC reported a roughly 33 percent vacancy rate in security staff in mid‑2022 that improved to the high‑teens (about 17 percent) after reforms. The commissioner said the department is focused on retention — historically producing high early attrition, which he described as roughly 40 percent in the first year — and that a new corrections‑specific pay plan will add roughly $10 million annually.

What the committee asked for next: lawmakers requested more granular overtime and ordering‑list data — the number of overtime hours worked before and after implementation — to evaluate whether the new schedule has reduced mandatory overtime overall. Several legislators emphasized guardrails: regular rest/relief expectations, limits on consecutive long shifts, and clearer supervisory enforcement so the schedule does not produce repeated sixteen‑hour days.

The committee did not take formal action during the hearing. Members said the conversation will continue at a future meeting and asked DOC to provide overtime metrics and other clarifying data to support policy choices and any legislative responses.