State Sen. Patty Ritchie, R-Heuvelton, a member of the Senate Standing Committee on Crime Victims, Crime and Correction, recently toured three North Country prisons—Riverview Correctional Facility in Ogdensburg, Ogdensburg Correctional Facility and Gouverneur Correctional Facility—with Senator Patrick Gallivan, chair of the Senate Standing Committee on Crime Victims, Crime and Correction.

The senators met with administrators and staff members at each facility to discuss the safety of prisons and corrections officers, according to a press release from Ritchie’s office.

During the visits, Gallivan and Ritchie, the daughter of a former corrections officer, expressed their gratitude for the work corrections officers do.

A bill from Sen. Ritchie, S.2949, to help ensure correctional facilities across the state have adequate staffing, has passed the Senate. Another bill she introduced, S.4077, would guarantee full retirement benefits for surviving family members of a retirement eligible corrections officer who dies while still on the job with the state Department of Corrections. That bill passed both the Senate and Assembly and has been delivered to the governor.

Ritchie’s Senate district, the 48th, covers northern and western St. Lawrence County including Ogdensburg, Canton, Gouverneur, Oswegatchie, Waddington, Lisbon, Madrid, Louisville, DeKalb, DePeyster, Hermon, Edwards, Fowler, Rossie, Macomb, Morristown, and Hammond.