COLUMBIA --- A planned survey of state Department of Corrections employees was canceled after the state prison chief sent an e-mail ahead of time advising workers of the survey.

The Legislative Audit Council canceled the survey after Corrections Director John Ozmint sent the e-mail June 17, The State of Columbia reported Sunday.

"It is easy and tempting to blame your immediate superiors, your senior leadership or this agency for low pay, low staffing, crowded prisons and insufficient equipment," Mr. Ozmint wrote in the e-mail to employees. "However, all of those problems are controlled by lawmakers.

"If you choose to answer the survey," the e-mail concludes, "do so honestly."

Mr. Ozmint also criticized the survey in a newsletter, calling it an attempt to blame administrators for the prison system's problems, which include legal judgments against the agency.

Audit council Director George Schroeder said the agency is continuing its overall audit of the prison system.

According to federal auditing standards, Mr. Schroeder wrote, "audit organizations must be free from external impairments to independence." Those impairments could be "actual or perceived" pressures from management or employees.

Chronic underfunding by the Legislature has forced the Corrections Department to leave new prison dorms empty because it can't pay for staff, Mr. Ozmint said. A recent escape from a Broad River prison occurred about 100 yards from an unmanned guard post, he said.

The prison system asked for a $21 million increase in its budget this year, then increased that amount to $55 million, citing a backlog of expenses. The agency has a total budget of $336 million. State Rep. Annette Young, the Dorchester Republican who heads the House corrections budget subcommittee, said it was irresponsible for the agency to raise its request, knowing the state was facing a tight budget.

But State Sen. Hugh Leatherman, the Florence Republican who is chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said he and many other committee members "have no idea what's going on at the Department of Corrections."