Settlement reached between DOC and Wright County

State Corrections Agents serving Wright County can rest easier now that a settlement has been reached for Wright County to transition to a Minnesota Community Corrections Act (CCA) model of probation supervision. While working at the Department of Corrections (DOC), MAPE members had been supervising felony-level offenders in the county under the County Probation Officer hybrid model of supervision. 

Last year, Wright County Board of Commissioners voted to shift from state-run felony probation programs to having all programs managed by the county. This shifted to layoff notices going out to a dozen DOC employees serving Wright County.   

According to Minnesota statute, counties are required to keep agents whole when they transfer from State to County employment under the CCA. This has generally been understood to mean that counties must honor the earned vacation and sick accrual balances of the agents. DOC management didn’t believe this was happening, and neither did Statewide Department of Corrections (DOC) Meet and Confer Chair Tabitha Schacht and DOC Field Services Meet and Confer Co-Chair Aarah Saugen. DOC revoked its assent to the CCA plan, and both the county and the state went to the courts to assert their separate positions. 

Even though the agents would shortly be leaving MAPE, the union felt that we had a duty to fight to preserve their benefits as they transitioned to a new employer. MAPE worked at the legislative level to look for a solution and prepared to join DOC’s lawsuit if necessary. Meanwhile, the DOC Meet and Confer team went directly to the County. 

In a letter to Wright County Commissioners, the MAPE leaders wrote, “As the Agents’ union, we feel a moral obligation to ensure they are treated as well as possible throughout the transition, even if we will not be representing them once they enter your employ. Therefore, we must strongly contest the County’s insistence that our agents give up their accumulated vacation and sick balances…The purpose of the statute is to leave them unharmed.” 

They continued, “The County has an invaluable opportunity here. If the County honors these balances and opens its door to our members, it will be hiring trained, professional Agents, bringing decades of experience to the task of keeping Wright County safe.” 

DOC Commissioner Paul Schnell and his team worked closely with MAPE leaders to ensure the transition from State to County employment would go smooth and fair. “Collaborative efforts between MAPE and the DOC paid off,” Meet and Confer Chair Schacht said. “This is a continuation of collaboration following the lessons learned from the handling of the Stillwater facility closure. Both sides are valuing frequent check-ins on an informal level before something becomes a glaring problem.”  

Schacht said that “the DOC really went to bat to ensure that if our agents went to the county, they would be treated fairly and have stable employment and not be at the whim of management there.”  

In the end, due to everyone’s efforts, a settlement was reached. The DOC would pay for the agents’ vacation balances to be transferred to the County. The probationary period would be waived for DOC probation agents if they had favorable job reviews with no disciplinary actions during the past 36 months. Lastly, the legislature created a workgroup to address the issue and ensure that these questions will be permanently resolved in the future. 

“After getting our disappointing offer letters from the County, the State actually took action to support our best interests. This is the first time in my 27-28 years working for the State that I felt they were working for us and were fighting for us,” Probation Officer Rachel Miller said.  

The transition date is scheduled for June 22, and DOC employees are expecting to get formal offers of employment from Wright County a few weeks before.