The understaffing of state prisons, psychiatric institutions and nursing homes hasn’t changed in my lifetime of 77 years.

I worked in the Arizona State Prison, in 1974-75, after graduating from the University of Arizona, it had a yearly turnover of 70%.

I worked with juveniles in Tucson and chronically mentally ill and sex offenders in Phoenix. These institutions were underpaid, and understaffed as a consequence. These are the professions that are dangerous, since the unstable nature of those warehoused in many cases pose a danger to themselves and others, which can change in a matter of moments.

The suicide-by-police scenario is more common than the general population is aware of, so police need to be trained in mental health in order to change their tactics from dehumanizing military offensive behavior to defensive listening, calming, non-confrontational behavior I used in all of my career, whether juveniles, prison inmates, mentally ill or sex offenders. Thankfully I was only assaulted by three psychotic individuals in all that time.

As a side note, while at the Arizona prison, a handful of employees and I started a union, in a “right to work for nothing” state, being intimidated by state capital goons with threats of being fired if we didn’t stop, but in 2009, I retired from the State of Arizona, a union member.

Robert Maki

L’Anse