PERSONNEL - COMMITTEE
Tuesday, January 17,
2023 - 10:00 AM
Stephanie DeZalia, Chairperson
Joe Pete Wilson, Vice-Chairperson
Chairperson DeZalia called this Personnel
Meeting to order at 10:00 am with the following Supervisors in attendance:
Clayton Barber, Robin DeLoria, Stephanie DeZalia, Derek Doty, Charlie
Harrington, Roy Holzer, Ken Hughes, Steve McNally, James Monty, Tom Scozzafava,
Matt Stanley, Ike Tyler, Joe Pete Wilson, Davina Winemiller, Margaret Wood and
Mark Wright. Shaun Gillilland was
excused. Noel Merrihew were absent.
Department Heads present: Jim Dougan, Judy
Garrison, Jennifer Mascarenas, Matt Watts and Michael Mascarenas.
News media – Alana Penny, Sun News.
DEZALIA:
Good morning, we will get this Personnel committee meeting in
order. We will start today with Jenn in
Personnel.
J. MASCARENAS:
Good morning. I have my monthly report and I do have the updated vacancy
list, I believe this month we are still at 76 vacant positions. The ones that we do manage to fill in other
departments we end up losing a couple more like always it balances out.
DEZALIA:
Did anybody have anything for Jenn.
MONTY:
This is actually for everyone in the room. I had a conversation with Jenn last week
pertaining to the United Way and we are in the process and middle of our 2023
campaign for United Way. United Way does
a tremendous amount of work in the tri-county area and they have done a lot the
last couple of years in Essex County so I am going to come and speak to the
department heads next month on that, the campaign is underway. Jenn has all the paperwork in her office but I
am going to challenge the Board of Supervisors like I do every year to make a
donation to the United Way. I, myself do it from here, I do it from the town, I
do it from my family but that’s my personal preference, my personal choice but
if we all gave $20 a week out of our paycheck that would be a phenomenal
amount. I’m not saying we have to do
that but just make a donation because United Way is serving our constituents,
they serve them anywhere from St. Armand to Ti, they’ve served them in Jay, they’ve served them in Lewis and they are
there when needed and if they can’t do it financially they will find someone to
do. Tom, they have helped you down there a couple times in Moriah and so I
really encourage you to support the United Way and I challenge each and every
one of you to make that donation. Thank
you. And Jenn has the paperwork and if
she doesn’t, I do.
DEZALIA:
Thank you.
STANLEY: I can actually second what Jim is
saying. We had our flood last February,
United Way lead the long-term recovery, and without them bringing other
organizations in, we would have people homeless in the Town of Jay.
MONTY:
And that is something I want to mention, thank you Matt. It is not only financial they have contacts
out there and bring together a lot of different organizations and non-for
profits to help during those times. Thank you.
DEZALIA:
Thank you.
WINEMILLER:
If we had done a payroll deduction previously do we need to do it every
year?
J. MASCARENAS:
Yes, you need to do it every year.
WINEMILLER: All right, okay.
DEZALIA:
Anything further?
DOTY:
Jenn, I have a question about an application you received for motor
vehicle licensed clerk, is that to fill down here because you know, naturally,
I’m interested in our office in Lake Placid but my impression is you need two
people to run that office?
J. MASCARENAS:
Well, any application that we get for Motor Vehicle Licensed Clerk will
go to Chelsea in the County Clerk’s office or Charlotte McGinn to review and
they hire based out of the Elizabethtown office and then they transfer
employees I’m assuming to Lake Placid and to Ti.
MASCARENAS: Yeah. I met with them last
week. Right now, they are trying to fill
spots here in hopes that maybe they can open those offices in the spring. They
have a lot of new people working there right now. If you go over there, you will see in the
window, it says I am a new employee, I am in training, please be patient those
kinds of things so, right now they are trying to stabilize this office. We’re doing a little bit better of a job and
I think once they get those people fully trained, operational positions filled,
we can talk about maybe opening up those other offices. I know the Ti one was
very profitable.
DOTY: Is
there a typical length of time to train a person? Two months?
MASCARENAS: Not that I am aware of. Those would be better questions for Chelsea
but I did meet with them last week on their staffing issues and those very
things just to see where they were headed and thought maybe by spring they
would be ready to ramp up and talk about opening one or both of those satellite
offices.
DOTY:
Very good. Thank you.
McNALLY:
I just have a comment. I’m going
to bring this to retention and recruitment but this came in my head over the
weekend. I work part-time for Target and the trucking industry has had a
terrible, terrible problem with retention and recruitment for the last ten
years and there’s thousands of drivers across the country and what trucking
companies have done in the last year is and I don’t know this is feasible
legally or what the cost would be but a lot of the companies now are going to a
weekly paycheck and the reason is like the county employees and a lot of
truckers in the area, a lot of these people live paycheck to paycheck and if
the cost is too expensive that may be a good recruitment tool. A lot of people rely on their paycheck and
waiting two weeks is a hardship and it’s just something I want to put out
there, I don’t know Dan is there a legality about weekly pay? Or if we could come up possibly before that
meeting with a cost on that?
MASCARENAS: I think for us what we would really
have to consider is what’s the administrative burden? Right?
Everywhere you look here in the county is we have people here wearing multiple
hats doing multiple jobs so I can tell you, in the Treasurer’s department
people, they are not just running payroll they are also doing your journal
entries, they are keeping your projects straight, that kind of thing. In Jenn’s office, there’s one girl that
spends a few days doing payroll stuff and then they are turning around and
doing other work for HR insurance all t hose types of things. So I think we really have to look at what the
administrative burden is, what would we have to hire additional individuals to
be able to pull this off and what that cost would be.
McNALLY:
Maybe just to be another tool, to make the county a better place to
work. I’ll bring that up through the
committee. Thank you.
SCOZZAFAVA: I think that would be monumental,
you just went to Munis, I mean, I am just thinking of the – I don’t know of any
municipalities that pay weekly? If there
is one here, let me know. I’m not aware of any.
MASCARENAS:
We can certainly check. We can
run a survey out there and see if any of them are doing that.
SCOZZAFAVA: It would be great but –
McNALLY:
I know that now if you go to a job advertisement for trucking jobs the
first thing is, paid weekly and I know what the county employees get paid and I
know what inflation is. I know the cost
of living, to buy a house, I mean, this would be very welcoming to the
employees I’m sure so if it’s doable and the cost is not prohibited, I think we
should look into it.
SCOZZAFAVA:
It certainly isn’t helping Mountain Lakes. I think they pay weekly.
McNALLY:
You know, if the cost isn’t too much it’s a benefit to the
employees. You know a lot of people
struggle waiting two weeks for a paycheck is a hardship.
DEZALIA: Okay, anything else further for
Jenn? Okay, thank you Jenn. Next up is Clerk of the Board and we’ll start
by saying, Happy Birthday Judy.
GARRISON:
Thank you. I submitted a monthly
report and I do not have anything in addition to that unless anyone has any
questions for me?
DEZALIA: Anything for Judy? No, thank you. Next, up we’ll have Dan.
MANNING: I don’t have anything but I would ask
that we move into executive session for a few items, legal advice relative to
the jail lease, the Golden Ring property in the North Elba, the Westport Hotel
and in addition to those, a personnel matter relative to the hiring and
employment history of a particular individual.
DEZALIA:
Moved by Ken and seconded by Matt.
All in favor. We will move into
executive session.
THE COMMITTEE MOVED
INTO EXECUTIVE SESSION AT 10:10 A.M. TO RECEIVE LEGAL ADVICE RELATIVE TO THE
JAIL LEASE, THE GOLDEN RING PROPERTY IN NORTH ELBA, THE WESTPORT HOTEL AND TO
DISCUSS A PERSONNEL MATTER RELATIVE TO HIRING AND EMPLOYMENT HISTORY OF A
PARTICULAR INDIVIDUAL.
THE COMMITTEE MOVED
BACK INTO OPEN SESSION AT 11:00 A.M.
DEZALIA:
All right, we will move back into session. Moved by Mr. Monty, seconded by Mr. Stanley
and we’ll give it to Dan now.
MANNING:
Thank you. No decisions were made
in executive session; it was just subject to my legal advice on a few matters
but I did have a couple of things that I did want to bring up. The first is I’d like to ask for a resolution
reclassifying the current position of DSS Attorney from DSS offices to my
office and reclassifying that as an Assistant County Attorney position at the
rate of $82,000.00, for Claudia Russell who now will be doing exclusively child
support and family hearing work that I might assign her. This resolution is necessary because Claudia,
at her private practice has represented numerous individuals and if these cases
are still current that would be a conflict if she were in the Office of the DSS
Counsel so will now be under my office.
The law provides that I can assign her family court work under the
County Law so that resolution again, $82,000.00, reclassifying the position
from the DSS Attorney’s position to a County Attorney position and a budget
transfer, this is already in the DSS line so a budget transfer for this money
in it and all benefits and costs associated with that salary.
RESOLUTION
AUTHORIZING THE RECLASSIFICATION OF DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SERVICES ATTORNEY TO
AN ASSISTANT COUNTY ATTORNEY AT THE RATE OF $82,000.00 A YEAR FOR CLAUDIA
RUSSELL AND FURTHER AUTHORIZING ANY BUDGET TRANSFERS FOR ALL BENEFITS AND COSTS
ASSOCIATED WITH THE SALARY. DeLoria,
Barber
DEZALIA:
Is there any further discussion on that resolution? All in favor.
MANNING:
Next, as you know we’re involved in a piece of property located in the
Town of North Elba, which was previously owned by Golden Ring
International. In order to get some
clarity on what’s going on it’s going to be necessary that we commission a
survey of the property. We are sort of under some time constraints in respect
to getting this survey. Robert Marvin is
a local surveyor has already surveyed this property and knows it well and
because of the exigencies of the circumstances that we’re under, I would
recommend that we commission Mr. Marvin to prepare a survey, metes and bounds
and set all corners with respect to our property we took in foreclosure in the
amount of $3500.00. So I would ask for a
motion, a second and a vote.
RESOLUTION
AUTHORIZING ROBERT MARVIN, SURVEYOR TO SURVEY A PIECE OF PROPERTY TOOK IN
FORECLOSURE, LOCATED IN THE TOWN OF NORTH ELBA IN THE AMOUNT OF $3500.00. Stanley, Hughes
DEZALIA:
Any further discussion on that survey?
All in favor.
MANNING: That’s all I had.
DEZALIA:
Anything else to come before the Personnel Committee?
MONTY: I’ve got the applications for the United
Way here. I did also want to add,
there’s 36 partner agencies in this brochure.
Your money can go directly to those partner agencies without any admin
taken out. If you give it to the United Way,
our current admin is approximately 14% of it for your knowledge. Thank you.
DEZALIA:
Thank you Jim. All right, we’ll
call this adjourned.
As
there was no further discussion to come before this Personnel Committee it was
adjourned at 11:05 a.m.
Respectfully submitted,
Judith Garrison, Clerk
Board of Supervisors