Prison vehicle changes unlikely

LITTLE ROCK — One Arkansas Department of Correction official - mental health administrator Bob Parker - will apply for a waiver to continue using a state-owned car to commute from his home in Sheridan to his office in Pine Bluff, a department spokesman said.

The department, which runs the state’s prisons and work-release centers, has 78 other employees who drive state-owned cars to work and back, but department officials do not believe any of them will need to apply for waivers under an executive order issued by Gov. Mike Beebe on Tuesday, department spokesman Dina Tyler said.

A day after Beebe issued his order, the state Game and Fish Commission announced that it would trim about 165 vehicles from its 658-vehicle fleet, eliminating vehicles for commission members, deputy directors, division chiefs and other administrative staff.

But Tyler said the Correction Department doesn’t expect to make any changes to its fleet. All of its take home cars are assigned to employees who respond to emergencies, regularly travel from their homes to different locations around the state or live at the same facility where they work, meaning the car stays on state property even when the employee takes it home. Those with cars include Director Ray Hobbs and his five deputy directors and assistant director.

“We pretty much don’t have extra cars sitting around here,” Tyler said. “We do a lot of traveling and a lot of moving.”

Beebe’s order allows employees to take home their cars if their jobs regularly require them to travel from home to various job sites or if they are required to respond immediately to an emergency affecting “public health, safety, or welfare.”

Employees who don’t fall into either category but still need a car for their job must apply for a waiver from the Department of Finance and Administration by Nov. 1.

Parker said he does travel from his office in Pine Bluff to meetings in Little Rock, to the department’s training academy and to prisons around the state, but he nevertheless plans to apply for a waiver.

He said he’s on-call to respond to mental health emergencies at all times but typically can handle whatever comes up by speaking to prison employees by phone. He is not part of the departments’ emergency response team, which handles things such as escapes, inmate violence and natural disasters.

Parker said he doesn’t know whether he will pay income tax on the use of his car for commuting, but his supervisors recommended a few months ago that he begin reimbursing the state for mileage for part of his commute. According to Arkansas Code 19-4-903, an employee who uses a state vehicle to commute but whose job does not require the vehicle must reimburse the state 15 cents for every mile driven over 10 miles each way during the commute.

Parker, whose commute is just less than 25 miles each way, said the reimbursement has been costing him $85 to $90 a month since he started paying it Aug. 1.

“I haven’t missed a minute’s sleep over it,” Parker said. “If that’s what’s required, that’s what I’ll do.”

Jake Bleed, a senior business analyst at the finance and administration department, said employees approved to use a state car for commuting will not have to reimburse the state for mileage.

The law requires such reimbursement only if the employee’s “job does not require the employee to utilize a state-owned motor vehicle for transportation to or from his or her permanent residence from or to his or her official station on a daily basis,” but the employee uses a car for commuting anyway.

If an employee has been approved to use a state car for commuting, “it has been determined that your job requires that utilization,” so no reimbursement would be necessary, Bleed said.

Tyler responded, “That’s one of those things where we’ll just have to wait and follow guidance.

“We’re trying to do what’s right, but some of this is new,” she said.

Beebe ordered a review of state vehicle use in August after articles in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette detailed how some constitutional officers didn’t pay income taxes on the fringe benefit of personal use of state vehicles. The articles have noted that of the more than 8,700 vehicles in state government, about 2,000 are used for commutes.

According to the Finance and Administration Department, the Correction Department has 422 vehicles, including buses and vans used to transport inmates, firetrucks and unlicensed “rover” pickups used to patrol outside prison fences. Of the agencies under Beebe’s control, the department ranks fourth in the size of its fleet behind the Arkansas State Police, the Agriculture Department and the Department of Human Services. The Correction Department has about 4,300 employees.

The Highway Transportation Department has 557 vehicles, but, like the Game and Fish Commission, is constitutionally independent from Beebe’s office. Like the Correction Department, the Highway Department said it doesn’t plan to make any changes to its vehicle fleet.

Beebe spokesman Matt DeCample said it’s not surprising that the Correction Department would need a lot of vehicles to oversee its 20 prisons and work release centers across the state.

“If they feel that they’re where they need to be, we’ll see if [the Finance and Administration Department] has any concerns going forward,” DeCample said. “Right now, I haven’t heard of any.”

Of the 79 vehicles used for commuting, 43 are assigned to wardens, deputy wardens, majors, farm managers and a dog kennel supervisor who live on prison grounds.

Five of the department’s top six officials also live on state property, at the department’s administrative complex in Pine Bluff. Deputy Director Sheila Sharp commutes to Pine Bluff from Little Rock, as does Tyler, who also has a state-issued car.

The top officials and Tyler are all part of the department’s emergency response team, Tyler said. Although Sharp is over administrative services, she said she has handled a variety of duties during escapes, including answering phones at the command center, coordinating staff assignments and culling information from inmate records.

When Charles Wilson escaped from the Cummins Unit in 2008, Sharp worked from a command center at a search area in the Ozark National Forest, near Jerusalem, setting up an agreement for searchers to be able to buy supplies and fuel at an area grocery store. Sharp said she and Tyler also carried Wilson’s photograph to about a dozen motels, asking if anyone had seen him.

Sheri Flynn, administrator of the department’s Sex Offender Screening and Risk Assessment program, said she uses her state-issued car to travel to training sessions for law enforcement officers, policy meetings in Little Rock and to conduct assessments of sex offenders at prisons and elsewhere, but she is not part of the Correction Department’s emergency response team.

That will change soon. On Monday, Flynn will begin aneight-week program at the White Hall Police Department so that she can become a certified reserve law enforcement officer and join the team.

Flynn said she decided to join a few months ago. She had been wanting to join anyway, she said, and wanted to eliminate any question about whether she should have a state car.

“I want to follow the rules and do everything absolutely by the book,” Flynn said. “If this is one way to make sure that we’re doing things within the governor’s wishes and the proclamation, then I’m all for it.”

The Department of Community Correction, which supervises the state’s probationers and parolees, ranks just behind the Correction Department with 399 vehicles in its fleet.

All but 61 of the Communtiy Correction Department’s vehicles are used for commuting. Of those, the Community Correction Department ranks behind only the State Police among the agencies under Beebe’s control.

Of the 338 Community Correction cars used for commuting, 287 are assigned to probation and parole officers or their supervisors. Eighteen are assigned to wardens, deputy wardens and chiefs of security at the department’s minimum security lockups, who the department says must respond to emergencies at the lockups.

Director David Eberhard and the department’s four deputy directors are also assigned cars and are listed as members of the department’s emergency response team.

Department spokesman Rhonda Sharp said most of the department’s take-home cars would likely be classified as being needed for emergency response, while others are used for regular travel to multiple offices. The department has not yet decided whether to make any changes in its fleet or apply for any waivers, she said.

“If we feel that a car fits one of the criteria of a waiver set forth in the directive, there’s a possibility we’ll seek to have a waiver,” she said.