AUGUSTA (AP) – A shortage of corrections officers at the Kennebec County Jail has forced the relocation of 25 Sagadahoc County inmates who were being housed there.

The inmates were transferred Tuesday to a jail in Cumberland County after the loss of two employees at the Kennebec jail left its inmate-to-staff ratio below the state-imposed minimum of 18 inmates for each corrections officer.

Kennebec Sheriff Everett Flannery quoted his staff as saying 25 inmates would have to be removed from the jail to meet the acceptable ratio of inmates to officers.

Sagadahoc, which does not have a jail and has a contract to board inmates in Kennebec County, had 28 inmates there Monday.

The Kennebec jail staff currently has 17 openings for corrections officers. When a cook quit over the weekend and with another on leave for medical reasons,

Flannery said he had to take two corrections officers from the main floor to fill in, and that caused the crisis.

Flannery told Kennebec County commissioners Tuesday that jail staff members have been working seven to eight shifts a week for more than a year.

Commissioners received a letter signed by 17 workers at the jail saying, “Staffing levels have been, and continue to be, below minimum standards.”

The staff said in a letter to the commissioners that workers at the jail have been putting in too many shifts for too long.

“The result is a physically and mentally fatigued and exhausted work force,” the letter stated. Jail staffers say they will hold commissioners “personally liable if we are injured during the course of our work operations as a result of the inadequate staffing conditions we are working under.”

AP-ES-11-05-03 0216EST