A mixture of dread and determination has settled on the ranges of Ontario’s jails, with warnings of inmates stockpiling drugs and weapons adding to the tension of a looming strike.

“I think people are really worried. I think everybody knows something really bad is going to happen if there’s a strike,” Tammy Carson, corrections health and safety chair for the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU), said Monday.

“We have friends inside, social workers and nurses. We have friends who are managers, too.”

Inmates are well aware of what could be coming and are stockpiling cigarettes, pills and weapons, said Carson, a correctional officer in Penetanguishene.

“They are getting ready, not necessarily for the people looking after them but for the people with them.”

A London lawyer with more than 100 inmates and ex-inmates as clients says he’s been getting calls from people behind bars expressing fears of what will happen during a strike.

“They’re worried about their own safety and what this is going to do to an already miserable existence,” Kevin Egan said.

“They are the ones who are going to suffer the most. They are going to be locked down all the time. When you lock guys together in a cell for 72 hours at a time it is going to lead to frustration and frustration leads to violence, so I am worried about it.”

Ontario’s 6,000 correctional workers could go on strike or be locked out as early as Jan. 9, forcing managers and civil servants from other departments to operate the province’s increasingly troubled jails.

OPSEU asked the Ministry of Labour four days ago for a no-board report that signals the end of conciliation and sets the stage for a legal strike or lockout in 17 days.

There was no word Monday if the no-board report had been issued.

The breakdown in negotiations over a new contract comes after more than a year of on-again, off-again talks and a tentative deal turned down by 67 per cent of union members that include staff in parole and probation offices.

The rejection was much higher at many of Ontario’s 28 corrections centres, where staff have faced increasing gang violence, mental health issues, overcrowding and understaffing for several years.

At the same time, they’ve seen their wages frozen and the gap between their salaries and others in the justice system, such as court officers, grow.

“Nobody wants to go on strike but we feel we have really don’t have a choice. We can’t continue on like this,” Carson said.

Asked about the mood at London’s Elgin-Middlesex Detention Centre — long a flashpoint for simmering troubles in the provincial system — a veteran officer replied, “Impatient. Waiting for the word and ready to hit the line. 17 days is a long time when you’re ready to go.”

Corrections workers are seeking an immediate 10 per cent raise, followed by three annual hikes of two per cent.

The provincial offer OPSEU members rejected included a zero increase for 2015, a 1.4 per cent lump sum payment for 2016 and a 1.4 per cent increase in 2017. As well, newer employees would not be able to move up the pay grid for two years.

The anger of corrections workers only grew with recent reports that some corrections managers had received three to five per cent wage increases and that the province was giving raises worth $58 million to 8,400 civil service managers.