Our KELOLAND News investigation has exposed worker complaints in Redfield and the number of sex offenders who are patients in the facility and how they are taken out into the community.
We brought concerns about the developmental center to Governor Daugaard.
Paul Register is the South Dakota Developmental Center worker who quit his job after a decade of service, so that he could go public with concerns he had over employee, client, and public safety at the Redfield facility. KELOLAND News brought you the exclusive interview with Register:
“We’ve come close at SDDC to having somebody killed; came very close. The one thing that I know that I just can’t sit back; I can’t be expected…I can’t be expected to sit back and watch it be one of my friends and know I didn’t do anything,” Register said.
Register is calling for the administration to be replaced at the facility. But Governor Dennis Daugaard is voicing support for current director Jan Banghart.
Former and current employees tell KELOLAND News that the clients at Redfield have become more criminal in recent years and that, along with staff shortages and mismanagement, have created a dangerous situation at the center for developmentally disabled teens and adults.
“Well we’re investigating that. I think Jan Banghart is trying to do a good job as administrator. Whenever you have complaints, of course you need to investigate them. And I don’t like to offer judgement for or against Jan until we investigate the nature of the complaints,” Daugaard said.
Human Services Secretary Gloria Pearson says her department is evaluating the injuries to workers at Redfield.
In 2015, there were 239 injuries reported by staff members. While that number is down slightly from the year before, some of the injuries may be more severe. KELOLAND News has spoken with employees who received concussions while on the job.
“So you need to look at all your injuries from all these vantage points, so you can zero in on the kids of changes that will reduce those injuries over time,” Daugaard said.
At the same time, the state is looking at making $623,000 in budget cuts to the Developmental Center and eliminating 5 staff positions.
“Some of those positions are legacy positions that should have been cut a long time ago. We haven��t been able to fill many of them. Some of those are being cut because we are trying to right size the geographic footprint of that facility,” Daugaard said.
The state wants to sell off vacant buildings and tear others, not in use, down. At the same time, Governor Daugaard says raising salaries may help ease the worker shortage at the facility.
“I’m proposing additional salary for folks that work there. We also want to take questions about safety of the workers and investigate them thoroughly,” Daugaard said.
Pearson told a legislative committee this week that SDDC management is addressing workers’ concerns and that the Bureau of Human Resources is conducting surveys among workers. We’ve had several workers contact KELOLAND News who did not want to be publicly identified, but were concerned about the confidentiality of those surveys.
They’re worried employees are fearing retaliation if they answer honestly, because they are required to enter their employee ID number on the survey.
KELOLAND News obtained a screen shot of the survey. But the head of state human resources tells us responses in the survey won’t be associated with the identity of the employee and that information is used in general terms for demographic purposes.
