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Union Members To Protest Closing Of Prison Farm Facilities

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Union activists say they are not happy with the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction’s decision to shutter ten prison farms.

The state announced last month that after a hundred years of operating farms at some prisons, it was phasing out the program and selling the farmland. The Ohio Civil Service Employees Association has already filed suit against the state over the planned closure of the prison farm facilities, which they say would affect 56 employees and more than 200 inmates who work on those farms. While they wait for a hearing later this month in a Franklin County Common Pleas courtroom, union activists are planning to protest. The Marion Correction Facility will be picketed in the coming days but future pickets are planned for livestock auctions at the Chillicothe, Pickaway, Lebanon and London correction facilities.

Contact Jo Ingles at jingles@statehousenews.org.