The furloughs, intended to prevent layoffs, began in August 2009, and ended in June 2010. Inmates who receive prison furloughs are not eligible for conjugal visits. The Massachusetts legislature quickly passed a bill prohibiting furloughs for such inmates. Those are spaces for inmates serving long sentences and not enjoying furloughs. These furloughs were in response to declining revenues during the COVID-19 pandemic. PEF began a legislative lobbying effort, but the legislature approved the furloughs. During the global recession of 2009 companies such as Intel, Toyota, and Gannett implemented furloughs. Exemption fraud proliferated in medical examinations, army furloughs, churches, schools, apothecaries and newspapers. In September 2019 the United States Department of Labor issued Fact Sheet #70 governing furloughs. In 1976, the Massachusetts legislature passed a measure to ban furloughs for first-degree murderers. The practice of regular furloughs was gradually extended to all recruits. Jones used the furloughs to obtain release of the prisoners under cover of darkness. He appeared with the Senators in a few games during two furloughs. Of the nine funding gaps between 1980 and 1990, only four led to furloughs. Most were partial or for single days or weekends and involved few if any furloughs.