The staff relationship is what is so important because there’s a staff unity here you can’t find anywhere else. We’re part of a unique “family”. Maybe we tease each other and squabble sometimes, but if one person hurts, we all hurt. There’s a kind of a warped sense of humour here. We need it. If the staff are happier, then the inmates are happier.

You learn to survive. No matter what side of the fence you’re on you have to survive. Some people could never survive in jail. Some inmates walk in as victimizers and end up as victims.

But I keep the job because of my relationship with the staff - not the inmates. The job is an eye opener. You’re working with the garbage can of the system.

Working on the line you’re working with negativity twelve hours a day. You have to learn how to deal with it so it won’t affect you. There’s a lot of stress in some jobs here. Kitchen work is the most demanding. I’ve been in a lot of positions here. In my work now I have more contact with other people, less with inmates. In some ways it’s the most enjoyable and satisfying job I’ve had here. Yet I miss working the line because I miss the staff - even though the risk is a lot greater.

About the system. It’s not black and white. Black and white didn’t work.

Prisons are necessary. There are no alternatives to protect society from law breakers. You have to have some way to contain them. But we could still do with many changes in the system.

There’s got to be more discipline. I’d like to see us go back to modified paramilitary, a tempered military system (military jails are more black than white).

I’d like to see the inmates that deserve a chance, get a chance. But they don’t always, mainly because they don’t know how to work the system. I don’t sympathize. People have to take responsibility for being stupid - for putting themselves in jail. Right now the system takes away a lot of responsibility. The guys have to be made responsible, and discipline helps here.

I’d like to see more treatment offered.

I’d like to see, as well as treatment, more education. We offer a minimal program right now. We have a huge rate of illiteracy in here. If there were some way in the prison system - if they could start training for a trade in here, even if they had to continue outside after completing their sentence … We’re not giving them tools to stay out of the system.

Discipline. Training. Treatment. These are the keys to being more effective.

It doesn’t matter what side of the bars you’re on - it isn’t black and white.

Bob
Principal Officer, Parole Coordinator
Community Correctional Office
Prince George Regional Correctional Centre

Update: The most recent update I could find had Bob still affiliated with governmental work in 2006.