Nearly 73 positions will be cut from the state's Butler Correctional Facility in Wayne County when the prison's minimum security complex is shut down on Oct. 1 to compensate for the shrinking inmate population, officials said.

With nearly 7,000 empty prison beds statewide, Erik Kriss, a DOCS spokesman, said it's estimated that the state will save $25.4 million over the next two fiscal years by closing seven prison annexes and three work camps.

Statewide, the closings are expected to cut an estimated 445 civilian and correctional officers' jobs at Butler, Easter, Groveland, Green Haven, Lakeview, Sullivan and Washington correctional facilities in addition to camps Pharsalie, Gabriels and Mt. McGregor, which will close by July 1.

Because many communities rely on those facilities to stabilize their local economy, Kriss said the state will not completely close any of the prisons.

“There will still be a prison in those communities,” Kriss said. “The legislators realize a lot of those small communities rely on prisons for jobs and economic stability.”

Even though none of the facilities outside of the prison camps will be completely closed, state Sen. Mike Nozzolio said he is disappointed that Albany is not giving employees at least a year to find a new job, which is required by state law if a prison is completely shut down.

“Give people time to move, it takes time to plan for that,” Nozzolio said. “That planning time was eliminated in this budget.”

With nearly 40 employees statewide leaving their prison position every two weeks, Kriss said DOCS wants to make a majority of the 445 cuts through attrition.

Because BCF will need at least 69 people to run its medium security facility, Kriss said employees with seniority will get priority for those positions and the remaining employees can be transferred to other prisons.

“We are doing the best we can to meet the needs of our employees and will transfer them to other posts,” Kriss said. “We want to make the least difficult transition that we can for them, but we have an obligation to the taxpayers.”

With BCF inmate work crews often cleaning up litter, brush and taking care of other small projects in the city, Jerry DelFavero, Auburn's supervisor of Public Works, said the closure means the city will lose a source of free manpower.

When his employees are busy on bigger projects, DelFavero said he relies on the work crews to take care of city beautification work. Now, DelFavero said, he may have to see if he can use more crews from the Cayuga County Jail, which may be difficult since other local municipalities are also asking for those crews.

“Twenty-five to 30 days of free labor; that's a month worth of work with six to 15 inmates,” DelFavero said. “For at least two or three days a week I could count on a work crew from Butler to help us out and we will have to cover that somehow. We will survive, we will still get things done.”

Staff writer Nate Robson can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 248 or nathan.robson@lee.net