Meat Processing Career Center
Where: Pickaway Correctional Institution, Orient
Inmate employees: 65
2009 production: 3.7 million pounds
Opened: 2004
Beverage Processing Center
Inmate employees: 23
2009 production: 2.47 million gallons
Opened: 1983
Steam rises off the backs of the skittish cows in the holding pen just outside the slaughterhouse at Pickaway Correctional Institution.
“I think that they know that they’re doomed,” said Becky Avery, the plant administrator.
Inmate Roger Badertscher, 65, of Bluffton uses a cattle prod to hustle a 1,500-pound animal up the gang plank.
“Hep, hep,” he calls. “C’mon, let’s go.”
On the other side of a door await convicted felons armed with knives and saws.
Welcome to the “harvest room.” Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections employee Leroy Wallace stands on a platform overlooking the condemned cow trapped in a large metal box open at the top. He loads a 25-caliber cap into a stun gun, leans over the animal, envisions an imaginary X between the eyes and ears and fires.
Over the next few minutes prisoners begin the process of butchering the cow: cutting the neck, draining the blood, lopping off the horns, removing the hide, and gutting the organs. Water is sprayed continuously to keep the odor at bay.
A meat inspector from the Ohio Department of Agriculture examines the carcasses and stamps them with a purple outline of the state — the mark of approval.
Inedible parts are tossed into 55-gallon drums, but meat from the cheeks and heart is saved. “You don’t want to throw that away when you have people to feed,” Avery said.
Indeed, the 37,000-square-foot plant processes 6,400 head of beef cattle a year — all of which are raised on prison farms. The operation supplies 3.7 million pounds of meat to the state’s 51,000 inmates — food that does not have to be purchased from outside sources.
Producing the meat in-house saved $3.3 million last year and provided job training for inmates.
Inmates are awarded Ohio State University certificates of completion in hazard analysis and food safety as well as carcass fabrication and retail cut identification. The plant employs 65 inmates.
A special kind of person
Ben Hurt, 27, of East Dayton said it takes a special kind of person to work the “harvest” floor. But Hurt, a convicted drug dealer who wears a red hard hat with the nickname “Big Hurt” written on it, said he likes working at the meat processing plant because he’s learning a trade and it gets him off the compound.
Next door, in a room held at 42 degrees, the sides of beef are chilled and cut into steaks. Not that inmates are getting steak. Almost every cut, including beef tenderloin, is ground.
“I wanted to cry every time I came in here and started throwing stuff in the grinder,” said DRC employee Luke Sherman. There is an effort under way to expand a “swap” program so the state could trade the more valuable meat cuts rather than grind them, he said.
Brian Lawson, 39, of Dayton uses a meat hook and sharp knife to butcher the meat. The sharp instruments are tethered to the table.
Lawson, who is serving a 15-year sentence for robbery, said he’s not worried about working next to inmates with deadly knives. “Most of us live in the same dorm and everybody knows everybody,” Lawson said. “As far as I know they’ve never had problems out here. Everybody gets along.”
Churning out milk for inmates
Less than a half a mile away but outside Pickaway’s razor-wire-topped fences is the prison system’s beverage processing plant. Raw milk from 750 Holsteins kept at five prison farms is picked up by tanker trucks every other day.
Within 72 hours the raw milk is pasteurized, homogenized and packaged into half-pint plastic pouches for inmate consumption. (The plastic baggies are produced at another prison.) The plant employs 23 inmates.
The plant churns out milk for $1.50 a gallon, which is a big savings since the state would likely pay $2 to $2.80 per gallon from a vendor. Last year it processed 1.9 million gallons of milk and another 500,000 gallons of flavored beverages.
“It’s a huge money savings,” plant manager Chris Graham said. Plus, he said, “A lot of these guys have frankly never worked a day in their lives.”
Roughly 2,000 gallons of cream each week are sold to an outside buyer since the prison system’s heart-healthy menu doesn’t include as much butter as it once did. Cream sales last year made $468,000 for the state.
The 11,900-square-foot plant opened in 1983 when the site was a mental health facility and expanded in 2000, said Graham, who has worked at the plant all those years. Graham said dairy processing plants on the outside pay about $15 an hour.
Roberto Rodriguez, 39, who is serving a four-year sentence for burglary, said his plan is to return to Defiance when he is released a year from now and work at a milk processing plant there. “I want to take it out there and use it out there.”
Contact this reporter at (614)224-1624 or lbischoff@DaytonDailyNews.com.
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