Dayton Correctional Institution stands out as having the highest vacancy rate in the state, with 18.8% of its budgeted correctional officer positions unfilled at the end of 2025.
Lebanon Correctional Institution and Warren Correctional Institution, the two other regional ODRC facilities, posted vacancy rates of 11.5% and 2.4%, respectively.
The obtained dataset shows the number of correctional officers that were actually employed by the ODRC at the end of the past five years, compared to the ideal and budgeted correctional officer positions.
The data suggests Ohio has gotten better at staffing its penal institutions since a low point in 2022, when the ODRC finished the year with a 12.4% vacancy rate for correctional officer openings across the state. The year prior, 2021, ended with a 11.1% vacancy rate.
| Year | Ohio’s EOY C.O. vacancy rate |
|---|---|
| 2021 | 11.1% |
| 2022 | 12.4% |
| 2023 | 8.8% |
| 2024 | 8.3% |
| 2025 | 7.4% |
ODRC Communications Chief JoEllen Smith told this outlet in an emailed statement that recruitment of staff “has and continues to be” a priority for the agency.
“Through deliberate and proactive strategies to address the specific needs of the men and women who work for the agency, Ohio has achieved a vacancy rate among the lowest in the nation, at 7.4%,“ Smith said. ”These strategies include allowing personal cellphones into facilities so staff can remain connected to their loved ones, advertising campaigns highlighting the important work being done by staff, streamlining hiring processes, allowing prisons to make same-day job offers, and working with the union to achieve the largest correction officer compensation increase in the agency’s history.”
Overall hiring figures from ODRC show that the agency ended 2025 with 6,352 employed correctional officers, compared to 6,284 in 2024; 6,292 in 2023; 6,033 in 2022; and 6,141 in 2021.
This outlet also asked the ODRC if any policy changes could explain staffing inconsistencies at the Dayton Correctional Institution, as the facility’s correctional officer staffing rate has fluctuated from 5.6% in 2021, to 6.3% in 2022, to 19.4% in 2023, to 5.6% in 2024 before falling to 18.8% in 2025. The question wasn’t directly addressed, but Smith said the Dayton prison was in the process of hiring two new shift sergeants to train and mentor new staff.
Legislation
Prison staffing was a major focus in November when lawmakers voted 82-3 to pass House Bill 338, a prison reform bill sparked by the death of Andy Lansing, a correctional officer at Ross Correctional Institution who was beat to death by an inmate on Christmas Day in 2024.
Rep. Mark Johnson, R-Chillicothe, whose district includes Ross Correctional and who championed the reform bill, told his peers on the House floor that Lansing’s death was partially due to a lack of staffing, highlighting ODRC’s dependency on using overtime to adequately staff Ohio’s prisons.
At the root of the staffing issues, Johnson alleged, was a slate of problems that ultimately led to an unsafe working environment for correctional officers and other penal institution staff. He said “(Ohio’s) prisons are the most dangerous places of employment, I believe, in the United States. I truly believe that.”
His bill, which now awaits action from the Ohio Senate, would enhance drug monitoring in prisons, restructure incentives like education programs, and enact a slew of mandatory minimums meant to disincentivize assaults on corrections officers, among other things.
The bill was jointly sponsored by Rep. Phil Plummer, R-Butler Twp., who told this outlet last week that he sees it as a primary tool to make staffing Ohio’s prisons easier.
“We have a bill to address a lot of the problems in the prisons,” Plummer told this outlet. “If you have a problem in prisons and the administration is not supporting employees, you’re not going to have any employees (anymore).”
Plummer, who previously oversaw the Montgomery County Jail as county sheriff, said he views the problem as fixable.
“We have some problems, but it’s a work in progress. I think we can fix that,” he said. “You create a culture where you have a safe working environment, the employees are valued, right, they’re paid properly, they have benefits, they’ll come to work. But if they don’t feel valued or safe, they’re out of there.”
Asked if he had any idea why Dayton Correctional Institution would be particularly difficult to staff, Plummer said: “You’re dealing with inmates on death row with nothing to lose. It’s a very tough job.”
Fcr more stories like this, sign up for our Ohio Politics newsletter. It’s free, curated, and delivered straight to your inbox every Thursday evening.
Avery Kreemer can be reached at 614-981-1422, on X, via email, or you can drop him a comment/tip with the survey below.
About the Author
