If you're asking from a front-line perspective, the real need is to sit down and discuss the statistics currently out there. Let's share the information. Let's see what's happening. Are we having problems in certain institutions or certain units because something is triggering that? We don't seem to have those discussions. Unfortunately, the department is not very forthcoming with statistical data where we can take a look at that, although recently they finally released a report on assaults on staff, which we've been advocating for, for a long time.
The other thing is, let's have a discussion about reality and resources. I've read the bill very thoroughly. If we're talking about four hours outside a cell, I can tell you that's impossible the way we're structured right now from a staffing and a health care standpoint. Before we get into introducing bills, in our view, these are some of the conversations or some of the legwork that needs to be done ahead of our introducing this type of bill.
Again, we're not completely opposed to some of the things in the bill, but at the same time we need to have those consultations begin on the front end. The fear of correctional officers is that we're going to implement the cart before the horse. The cart is out of the barn running and the horse is chasing it. We need to start engaging those discussions earlier, before we see a bill. Let's have real conversations.
I can't emphasize enough that we're the ones running the institutions. Yes, we have our wardens and our parole board and everybody has a role to play, but at the end of the day, on weekends and during the night, correctional officers are operating the facility, nobody else. We need to know exactly, ahead of time, where we're going with these types of bills and what impact it's going to have on us.