Layoffs delayed after member uncovers possible CDCR fraud

Layoff letter's false postal meter date - 800 layoffs postponed

Updated Jan. 27, 2010
More than 800 Local 1000 members have received a 30-day reprieve from being laid-off. The delay comes after an alert prison teacher discovered that the state was involved in a possible mail fraud scheme.

On Jan. 8, Don Wiley, a prison vocational teacher at Chuckawalla Valley State Prison in Blythe, received a 30-day layoff notice dated Dec. 31. Wiley went to his local postmaster to try to find out why it took so long for the metered letter to travel from California Department of Correction and Rehabilitation (CDCR) headquarters in Sacramento to Blythe.

Postal inspectors determined that although the letter's "meter date" was Dec. 31, it had not actually been mailed until Jan. 6 - an apparent violation of federal law.  

"It was pretty obvious what they had done - they screwed up and they tried to cover it up," Wiley said. "I'm convinced that someone in CDCR ordered their staff to pre-date all of these envelopes even though they couldn't mail them for another week."   

Wiley immediately notified Local 1000 leaders who quickly determined that hundreds of other CDCR members had received layoff letters that had apparently been backdated. Within days more than 200 members filed grievances.

"Don's discovery was the catalyst that sent hundreds of members all over the state into action," said Cindie Fonseca, chair of Bargaining Unit 3. "With all those grievances in hand, we were able to force CDCR to back off for a month."  

In a related development, a San Francisco judge on Tuesday rejected the state's efforts to derail Local 1000's lawsuit which would prevent the state from gutting prison inmate education and rehabilitation programs. Judge Peter Busch determined the lawsuit had enough merit for a full hearing and set a Feb. 24 hearing on our request for a temporary injunction to stop the program cuts.

View a copy of Wiley's correspondence with the postmaster