Q&A: New detention center admin talks position, goals

Roosevelt County Detention Center Administrator Justin Porter said he has always enjoyed learning, and is looking forward to his future in Portales.

Porter, from Las Cruces, was the audit compliance training captain at the Dona Ana County Detention Center before coming to Portales in April. He said he hopes to streamline RCDC's practices so it can continually improve.

"Hopefully, in the end, everything gets a little bit better," he said.

Porter said he has felt welcome in Portales.

"We really like this town. Everybody's been super nice to us and everything else," he said.

At the last county commission meeting, you mentioned new accreditation requirements and new ways to bring in revenue. Talk about some of these.

I was one of the auditors for the New Mexico Association of Counties in the accreditation process, so I used to go around to the facilities and inspect them and look at their practice and their policy and everything else, and see if they were providing the appropriate level of service.

Some of the things that we are looking at adapting are going to be regulating a little bit more the frequency of checks on the detainee populations at various custody levels.

How often do we think a different classification of people should be checked on? We're gonna look at some of the services that we provide, and what directions we want to go.

The accreditation has been going on about eight years now, in the development, so it's about time to refresh it, update it. We're looking at some of the practices, also some of the litigation issues that will happen throughout the state and the country, and see where some of the laws are starting to require more services, more opportunities.

That's what we're trying to gear the standards toward, is what's going on currently, and try and stay ahead of some of the changes.

The new revenue is specific to this place. There are some smaller communities than this that could use the services of the detention center. Most counties have an obligation to provide some kind of detention services, but their budget and size may not mean that they can afford to build a building like this, operate it, and everything else, because their daily population may be only five people.

Some of the smaller communities reach out to the larger communities, and say, "Can we house our people with you, and basically pay you to provide that service?" The county manager, Amber (Hamilton), has been in contact with some of those communities like that, and is getting ready to offer our services and say, "Do you want to bring your people here?" instead of trying to provide a service in that community.

What would you say are the most important leadership qualities to have in corrections?

Whether it's a supervisor or an officer, the first skill that really gets everybody through is they've gotta be a good communicator. Being a good communicator can help you with a lot of situations here, lets you understand what people need.

If you're a good communicator, you can often talk yourself out of situations that are starting to go bad. Great communication skills are huge in this, and I think more as a supervisor, because they're asked to kind of quell some of the things that are starting to get out of control, or if an officer can't handle it.

Ultimately, from my level, I've got to be able to articulate my expectations, give direction on where we want to go, and do some follow-up on that to make sure we're going in the direction we need to be going.

The other is responsibility. We're in the line of work where we've gotta be responsible for ourselves and everybody else that's here, so we can't take our job lightly. We have to be responsible and accountable for what we do.

Confidence is another. We often have to deal with difficult situations, and we need to be confident in our answers. We need to be confident in how we resolve a situation, but confidence is something people have to develop. It's very difficult. You can't hand somebody an hour block of training, and then they have confidence.

What improvements do you most look forward to with operating RCDC?

One of the things that I would like to see is we need to start preparing our staff for supervisory roles. Everybody here can be prepared a little bit more for the next step. One of my goals has always been I want to make sure that the people who work for me, work with me, are able to do my job when I'm not here.

Is there an officer working here that is ready to do the sergeant's job if there's a family illness and somebody needs to be gone for a month? The same, as a sergeant, if a lieutenant's gone. Do I have a sergeant who can fill that role and step in, so the facility doesn't suffer?

We're dealing with people's livelihood and care and welfare here, so we really need to prepare everybody for that next step. It's good for them, because most people want to excel, so if you're preparing them and getting them ready for that, then when it's time for them to take that next step, they're ready, they're excited, they're motivated. I'd really like to try and get them ready.

That's gonna mean some changes in some of their trainings, and raising the expectations a little bit. Much like the standards are changing, I want to change the expectations here a little bit and kind of get everybody's performance to improve a little bit, no matter what role they're in now.

I'm hoping, here in the near future, and then in a year, when I look back, we're gonna see those strides toward reaching those goals; that we're gonna see people that are more prepared to step into supervisory roles, and supervisors that are more prepared to step up into larger roles and capacities.

The services here, if I can improve those things, will improve for the detainees. I think they'll get a better quality of supervision at the officer level and the supervisory level.

- Compiled by Staff Writer Eamon Scarbrough