Mayor's Employee Council
January 8, 2009
Meeting Summary
Members Attending: Carol Boyd, Taft Bradley, Beverly Crockett, Donna Henderson-Braden, Debra Louis, Minnie McCray, Bill Robillo, Della Sheffield, Anthony Smith, Stacy Taylor, Tonia Wilks
Members Absent: Ron Benson, David Cowan, Tarrus Crews, Deborah Davis-Williamson, Errol Edingbourgh
Staff Attending: James Huntzicker, CAO, Grace Hutchinson, Deputy Director A&F, Marcia Boyd, CAO Staff
Council Changes:
It was announced that David Thorpe had left his position with the County to take a job with TVA. A replacement from the Health Department will be selected.
Review of Previous Issues:
There were no hold-over issues from the previous meeting.
In the Mayor's absence, James Huntzicker chaired the meeting.
New Issues/Suggestions:
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An employee wanted to know the status of raises or stipends this year, if there would be employee layoffs, if departments would close down on certain days and how safe employees' current pay rates are.
Response: Jim Huntzicker explained that since we are uncertain where we are with the budget some of the questions are difficult to answer. We are still waiting to consider what cuts will be made to the grants funded by the State; if City funding of the Health Department will discontinue; and what the decrease in revenues will be from property taxes because of increased foreclosures. He explained that the Commission is still pursuing the concept of a stipend, but delayed voting on it. The new budget does have a 3% raise for employees, but it is unknown if it will remain in the budget. Considering that the Commissioners don't want a tax increase, cuts will have to be made in personnel and services. The County is looking for new ideas on how to provide services more efficiently that have a more long-range impact than simply cutting employees. Additionally, we are looking at revenue opportunities and cutting duplicate functions. Because there are several safety areas that operate 24/7 it would be impossible to shut down all areas for a day. He encouraged Council members to email any ideas they have to increase revenues and cut expenses.
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An employee suggested raising some fees and suggested the Vector Services fee attached to the MLGW bill. Response: Fees such as Vector Services must be used for that service and cannot be used to support other areas. Although increasing most fees requires approval from the State, fees increases can be considered if they are not covering the cost of providing the service.
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One suggestion from an employee was to allow employees to "cash-in" one week of annual leave rather than take time off. This would keep the employee on the job and still provide he/she with additional funds. Response: This might be a problem for grant funded positions, but is a suggestion that could be considered.
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An employee wanted to know if there could be "rolling furloughs" where there would be mandatory days the work area would be closed. Response: This could not be done in all areas because of the public safety issue. Certain areas have implemented a 4-day work week, but this does not require a shut-down of the work area and really does not provide a savings.
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There was a question about cutting a percent of employees' wages like FedEx is doing. Response: FedEx employees were getting significant raises for several years so to suddenly take a cut is not as dramatic for them as it would be for County employees who have gotten small or no raises over the past few years.
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An employee wanted to know if there was any consideration of consolidating the Jail and Correction Center.
Response: There are no current discussions. This was discussed a few years ago, but was not continued after the Jail study was done.
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There was a question if those divisions that have their own IT will be consolidated with the Shelby County IT department.
Response: Although there are attempts to combine some functions, the process is not very far along.
James Huntzicker discussed the Job Freeze Committee that has operated the past few months. Job requests are reviewed by the committee. Of 230 jobs, 37 have been denied at about a $1.5 million savings. He discussed about how it needs to be easier for the employees to transfer to other job positions around the County rather than lose their job completely.
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An employee brought a suggestion from her area that lower paid employees should receive a stimulus pay and employees at the administrative level take a cut in pay. Response: It was explained that the stipend that was paid to employees making less that $40,000 last summer was to help cover increased health benefits. Increases received by some upper level employees in the past were to compensate for increased job responsibilities.
Marcia Boyd reviewed the changes to the Performance Appraisal forms with the members.
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The next meeting will be February 17, 2009 at 3:00 PM. |
