In a TN State Senate hearing on Thursday, August 27, 2015, Commissioner Schofield of the Tennessee Department of Correction stated he had requested that the ACA conduct an "outside, independent investigation" on the allegations of vacancies and the classification of incident reports. 

However, given that Commissioner Schofield sits on the ACA Standards Committee, that TDOC pays ACA for accreditation manuals, that the prisons employ ACA compliance managers to keep the files for inspections and audits and ensure both are passed, and that TDOC prisons know well in advance of the ACA accreditation inspections (every year) and audits (occurring every three years), we find these things to present a direct conflict of interest and make it nearly impossible to receive an audit that truly shows what's going on in Tennessee's prisons.

We, the undersigned, are current and former employees, family, friends, and supporters of TDOC Correctional Officers, and we fear daily for our/their safety as both vacancies and assaults have increased exponentially in recent months, yet official information has downplayed the seriousness of these issues or denied them completely.

We are imploring you to require a true "outside, independent agency," like the NIC (National Institute for a Corrections, a division of the Department of Justice), to conduct an investigation/audit into these concerns.

 Correctional Officers put their lives on the line daily to protect Tennesseans from the worst society has to offer – and all we ask for is an investigation performed by an entity other than one the state pays for accreditation (by their own admission, $70,000+ in the last year). If everything is being done correctly by the Tennessee Department of Correction, then there is nothing to fear by requiring an NIC audit or an audit from a similar government agency. Please help us.