1 2 3 4 5 6 KERR COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT 7 Workshop 8 Wednesday, November 5, 2008 9 1:30 p.m. 10 Commissioners' Courtroom 11 Kerr County Courthouse 12 Kerrville, Texas 13 14 15 16 Workshop to update the Kerr County Personnel Policy Handbook 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 PRESENT: PAT TINLEY, Kerr County Judge H. A. "BUSTER" BALDWIN, Commissioner Pct. 1 24 WILLIAM "BILL" WILLIAMS, Commissioner Pct. 2 JONATHAN LETZ, Commissioner Pct. 3 25 BRUCE OEHLER, Commissioner Pct. 4 2 1 On Wednesday, November 5, 2008, at 2:43 p.m., a 2 workshop of the Kerr County Commissioners Court was held in 3 the Commissioners' Courtroom, Kerr County Courthouse, 4 Kerrville, Texas, and the following proceedings were had in 5 open court: 6 P R O C E E D I N G S 7 JUDGE TINLEY: We will now convene a workshop 8 posted and scheduled for this date and time, Wednesday, 9 November 5, 2008 at 1:30 p.m. It is significantly past that. 10 We were delayed starting it because of the 1 o'clock meeting. 11 The item on the workshop agenda is to participate in a 12 workshop to update the Kerr County personnel policy handbook. 13 Ms. Hyde? 14 MS. HYDE: If you will open up the green books, 15 this is the current policy book. To help answer the question 16 before Commissioner Baldwin asks it, the best I can find is 17 this was really done in 1986, and there were very few minor 18 modifications when it was approved in 1999. In the front of 19 the book, there should be an areas of change that's 38 pages 20 long before I stopped. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Why'd you stop? 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, I got it. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Stapled on the wrong side, of 24 course. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, it is. 11-05-08 wk 3 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Is this the online -- the thing 2 that I've been reading? 3 MS. HYDE: No, that's the old one. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I know this is the -- okay. 5 MS. HYDE: There's no way -- this green book was 6 never put into anything that could be put online. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 8 MS. HYDE: In trying to put it so that you guys 9 could get it, it was ugly and you would have had to blow it 10 up huge to be able to read it, so I quit typing. I was 11 trying to type it, and I just quit typing. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. 13 MS. HYDE: So, you're going to have to go in 14 between the two. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, it's almost easier just to 16 start from scratch on our new one, and not worry about the 17 old one. 18 (Ms. Hyde nodded.) 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Because it's changed so much. 20 MS. HYDE: Because I tried to put together 21 significant changes from the old policy book, yada, yada, 22 yada, but due to the major differences and changes in '99 to 23 2008, this document became almost as large as the new one, so 24 I stopped. If you go to the last page of this thing, the -- 25 the handout, Sections 5, 6, and 7 are totally new. Section 9 11-05-08 wk 4 1 is totally new. Section 8 will be completed by our Sheriff, 2 'cause it's County Facilities Security, and he's working on 3 it. Section 10 is Information Technology; that's being 4 reviewed and modified by our County Attorney and his 5 committee. Section 11 is FMLA, still under review. It 6 should replace our current FMLA; however, the military FMLA 7 is not out yet for guidance, and in Section 12, it's 8 incomplete, but can be approved as written and added to as 9 the offices make their guidelines known; reviewed, modified, 10 and then presented to y'all for approval. 11 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So, you can have these back. I 12 don't need this one. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah. What do we need this 14 for? 15 MS. HYDE: 'Cause there's some comparisons. It 16 says, "See Page 6," or see this or see that. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll keep the small one and 18 give you back the big one. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'd rather start from the new 20 one. Then my question is, last time we were here, you were 21 being chintzy and only give us one copy of the new one, and 22 made us look at it online, which I did. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Did you not keep your areas of 24 change? 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: No. 11-05-08 wk 5 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Ms. Grinstead has it on the 2 computer; she can print it out for you in a matter of 3 minutes. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: She's not being chintzy today. 5 MS. HYDE: I didn't have long enough to do it. 6 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You're saving -- 7 MS. HYDE: Judge, you've got one, right? 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You were saving the taxpayers 9 money. 10 MS. HYDE: This has been revised, Judge. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Oh. 12 MS. HYDE: Give me that old one. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: 9/9, 10/30. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: So ... 15 (Low-voice discussion off the record.) 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What is this? 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: At least she could have 18 stapled this one. 19 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This is the update of this 20 one. I'll give you that one. 21 MS. HYDE: You've got a note in your old one. You 22 might want to move it to the new one. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I just checked it out. Let 24 me see. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't know whether you 11-05-08 wk 6 1 planned this for today, but I was reading it online, and I 2 had quite a few changes. Not -- there weren't a lot of them; 3 they were pretty small. Just questions, I guess. But it was 4 difficult to go on and make them, so I was waiting to get 5 this so that I can go back and read it again. So, we're not 6 going to get through it today, 'cause I'm not ready at great 7 length on it. We are -- 8 MS. HYDE: That's up to y'all. I'm at y'all's 9 disposal. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I would rather take it home, 11 read it, mark it up, and then come back, personally. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Question. 13 MS. HYDE: Sir? 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This document that you 15 stopped on Page 38 or wherever it was, how does that tie to 16 the one that you just gave us, revised 10/30? 17 MS. HYDE: Well, it's just telling you what I went 18 ahead and did, 'cause I figured you'd give me the green books 19 back, so I went ahead and tried to type in as much of the old 20 one as possible, and then copy and paste the new underneath 21 it. But there's some of them that just says the whole 22 section is gone. I mean, some of that stuff was -- was 1982 23 federal law that has been, like, modified multiple times, so 24 we just kind of threw it out and -- and went current law. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Second question. This list 11-05-08 wk 7 1 of open issues -- 2 MS. HYDE: Mm-hmm? 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Are they still open, or are 4 they dealt with in this? 5 MS. HYDE: Most of them are still open. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: They're not addressed in this latest 7 draft at all? 8 MS. HYDE: They're still showing as open. They're 9 still showing as -- as if they're open. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: In process. 11 MS. HYDE: In process. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Work in progress? 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do you have a time frame in 14 your mind that these things will be completed and we have a 15 full-blown completed document by the end of the year? 16 MS. HYDE: The plan is to have it so that we can do 17 it during open enrollment, which will be in December. 18 Because -- 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's right, I remember you 20 saying that. 21 MS. HYDE: Because we want to try to do it all in 22 one. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's good. So, this thing 24 will be completed then. 25 MS. HYDE: If they're not completed, then the stuff 11-05-08 wk 8 1 that I can get done will be done. The stuff that is to be 2 done by other folks may not be. Some of it we do need to 3 talk about so that I can finish it. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, do we need to talk to 5 the Sheriff and the County Attorney? 6 MS. HYDE: The Sheriff is working on his. The 7 County Attorney's working on his. They'll have them done. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Ms. Hyde? 10 MS. HYDE: Can I sit if I'm going to have to write? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Sure. Do you have kind of a bullet 12 point without the -- without the Power Point that tells us 13 some of the major changes that affect virtually every 14 employee that are being proposed? From the policy book that 15 we have kind of sort of been using? 16 MS. HYDE: Sort of. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: That you can, you know, kind of hit 18 some high points on? 19 MS. HYDE: Um -- 20 JUDGE TINLEY: That will be a good starting point. 21 MS. HYDE: The first one will be the recommendation 22 that our sick days go from -- from 12 per year to 6. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: From 12 per year to 6? 24 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I read that. 11-05-08 wk 9 1 MS. HYDE: Multiple rationales for that. One is 2 pure cost. The other was that we have talked about 3 progressively going to the County paying for LTD or STD for 4 the employees, which would make earning sick days possibly 5 redundant at that point, if they're paid for long-term and 6 short-term disability. But what we also have found is that, 7 unfortunately, sick days in a lot of cases are not being 8 used -- 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Appropriately. 10 MS. HYDE: -- appropriately. So, they're being 11 taken advantage of. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Being used as personal days. 13 MS. HYDE: The idea when we talked about long-term 14 and short-term disability, basically turning the sick days 15 into something else; call them personal days, personal leave 16 days, and take away that "sick." Not lose -- the employees 17 that have sick time would not lose anything at this point. 18 We're not talking about hijacking any of those hours or those 19 days that they have. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, do you want to say 21 personal leave or sick? So people -- so that even the 22 employees understand that these are sick days too? Because 23 they can use them for either one. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Not convertible to cash at 25 the end of the -- 11-05-08 wk 10 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can Sally Sue give Billy Bob 2 her leftovers? 3 MS. HYDE: No, sir, we don't have a bank. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I kind of like the word 5 "sick." After last night. (Laughter.) Just thought I'd 6 throw that in. I've got a question, a specific question on 7 Page 3. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Of which document? 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: This thing. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This thing right here, 11 okay. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Reclassifications. 13 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's see. I think I'm -- 15 I'm not sure what I'm seeing here. But, like, under 7.09, 16 reclassification -- this is the old one. 17 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And you changed it to 19 something else down below there, 1.18. Now, I don't see -- I 20 don't see much change in the -- the real content of the two 21 things, except for the language. 22 MS. HYDE: And the merit. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Huh? 24 MS. HYDE: And the merit. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And I like the language of 11-05-08 wk 11 1 the old one. It just -- it makes more sense. It's an easier 2 read. I'm just throwing that out as a suggestion to have a 3 discussion here. And I hope I don't find a lot of that kind 4 of stuff throughout here. 5 MS. HYDE: Well, if you do, you got a lot of folks 6 on the committee that worked hard on this. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well -- 8 MS. HYDE: Including the County Attorney, because 9 of language problems. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, I don't care about 11 that at all. Actually, it does sound like a lawyer got ahold 12 of it. (Laughter.) That's probably one of my points. So -- 13 MR. EMERSON: That's what the slime trail is on 14 there, Buster. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Huh? 16 MR. EMERSON: That's what the slime trial is going 17 on there. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. So, what is the 19 addition? 20 MS. HYDE: Well, one is -- 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why is there a change? 22 MS. HYDE: One of them is the merit consideration, 23 the last paragraph. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Well, see, if it were 25 me, I would -- if that's an addition, I would just add it to 11-05-08 wk 12 1 that old one and go on down the dadgum road. Why are -- why 2 add all these big fancy words? 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, there are two 4 grammatical errors in the last sentence, but you'll catch 5 those. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: In the new one? In the new 7 one? Give me some fuel here. 8 MS. HYDE: Why don't we just go out there and get 9 the rocks? 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: The old one just has plainer 11 language. It's just plain language. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: Do you understand the new? 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, but I had to read it 16 seven, eight times. 17 MS. PIEPER: With the old one, we get -- or I get 18 too much questions from my employees; then I have to go get 19 clarification. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's why you have to put 22 lawyer language in there. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's why you have to put 24 lawyer language in there. 25 MS. PIEPER: Probably 'cause they read all these 11-05-08 wk 13 1 legal documents all day. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: And because we have Commissioner 3 Williams, we don't have to submit it to Ellen Iseman for 4 review. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's exactly right. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Got your own built-in spell 7 check here. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And I'm not jumping on this 9 thing in particular. I'm just using this as an example of -- 10 are the changes throughout, are they verbiage, or is there 11 really some substance, some kind of change? 12 MS. HYDE: For the most part, there's substance. 13 Like, in this, the substance is that it's merit. You won't 14 be eligible for merit. And the way that the new grades are 15 and the steps are and the way that the old one read, people 16 were able to jump steps and jump grades, and in the new one, 17 they can't unless Commissioners Court gives an order. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Unless you come in and prove 19 to the Commissioners Court that there's education or 20 experience and those kinds of things. 21 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir, prior approval. Not after the 22 fact. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Thank you for the 24 dialogue. I enjoyed it so much. 25 MS. HYDE: Thank you, sir. Prior service, on that 11-05-08 wk 14 1 first page, you asked if there's some -- so I can -- I'm 2 assuming you'd like me to go on. Prior service with the 3 County. In the old book, it said that continuous service -- 4 you could quit or leave and come back on the 364th day, and 5 you're right back where you were, which was very strange and 6 -- and very different. So, then I thought maybe it had to do 7 with just county government, but it appears that in the 8 policy books that other counties have, ours was a tad 9 different. Most of them have 90 to 60 days is considered a 10 break in service, and ours was 365 days, which means that 11 they got everything back that they had prior to leaving. So, 12 if they were earning four weeks of vacation, then they went 13 back to earning four weeks of vacation. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: I think 90 is too long, frankly. I 15 think probably go down to 60. 16 MS. HYDE: We had the 60/90 discussion. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I have a question. 18 MS. HYDE: Okay. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Page 28, 3.14, accident 20 reporting. 21 MS. HYDE: Mm-hmm. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I -- 23 MS. HYDE: Page 28? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: In the new draft. 25 MS. HYDE: Oh. 11-05-08 wk 15 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: And I understand that the 2 intent of this is really, you know, vehicular accident, 3 something like that, but if I was to read this and I worked 4 for Road and Bridge Department, and I was driving a Road and 5 Bridge mower and I hit a telephone pole, or I hit someone's 6 gate or hit anything, I look at this, you got a way for 7 action, reporting, all that. When I -- well, I mean, that's 8 not practical. May not even be a -- you know, you call the 9 -- the landowner whose post you hit, and you -- and they fix 10 it. I mean, I don't think Rusty wants to do an accident 11 report on us scratching a post somewhere. 12 MS. HYDE: No, that's not what this is meant. 13 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I know, but that's -- but I'm 14 reading it as regardless of how small. And -- 'cause it 15 talks about equipment, too. Anyway, so I'm just -- 16 MS. HYDE: Our insurance -- our insurance does 17 dictate that any incident -- any accident, no matter how 18 slight, has to be reported. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But I guess the accident -- 20 what if it's not even our property? Say Road and Bridge is 21 in their yard, and one -- and, you know, Joey Biermann backs 22 into a tractor, dents the tractor, whatever, something like 23 that happens. That's an accident, but that doesn't need a 24 police report. 25 MS. HYDE: No, it doesn't. 11-05-08 wk 16 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But it says it has to -- I 2 guess I read this that if -- I'm reading it now verbatim, and 3 it says, any accident, regardless of how small, you go 4 through law enforcement. I mean, I think there needs to be 5 some language in there that says -- 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I can understand their 7 supervisor having to be notified immediately. Period. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I agree. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No matter what, and then a 10 determination needs to be made whether it should be -- 11 whether it's required to be reported to law enforcement. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Just change it to "and/or." 13 Then you got it both ways. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Or say "and," comma, "if 15 appropriate." 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, 'cause there's a value 17 limit on when it has to be investigated. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Law enforcement -- 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think it's a -- if it's a -- 20 you know, if law enforcement needs to be involved, they need 21 to be involved. But if they don't -- 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: In mean, we have it where the 23 supervisor has to be notified right then, and then a 24 determination -- 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But my -- before I start 11-05-08 wk 17 1 reading the first part, the part that really caught my 2 question -- or attention on the second page, on Page 29, it 3 says at the very end, highlighted, drug test, question mark. 4 What about small fender-benders? At what monetary value? 5 Which I presume these are questions that you have for us to 6 look at. At what point do you want us to go through and, I 7 mean -- 8 MS. HYDE: Well, these are questions that we had 9 when we ended. These are questions that we felt like needed 10 to be discussed. I mean, do you use DOT values, where if 11 it's less than $500 -- I mean if it's over $500? But you 12 also need to get what does our insurance state? 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's changed now to, like, 14 1,500 or something. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But the drug test -- I mean, I 16 take it it means that we require a drug test if it's over a 17 certain value. 18 MS. HYDE: Well, if you're doing DOT, DOT requires 19 a drug test if there's an accident that has an injury, has 20 damage to the vehicle, it has to be towed. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: DOT, Department of 22 Transportation? 23 MS. HYDE: Mm-hmm. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: If -- I guess -- I mean, you're 25 talking a lingo I'm not sure about. If I'm in an accident 11-05-08 wk 18 1 and I'm a Commissioner, I have to have a drug test 2 automatically? 3 MS. HYDE: No, you're not driving a county vehicle. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Any time you're in a county 5 vehicle, any employee, you have to? That's -- Department of 6 Transportation says that? 7 MS. HYDE: Well, I mean, that's normally the rule 8 for DOT. 9 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm just -- I mean, I'm -- I 10 just didn't -- I don't know. I mean, that's why I'm asking. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You mean if somebody has an 12 accident, and I'm assuming an accident is a -- 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Judge and I are second. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I just got one word out; 15 everybody is shaking their head. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I already know that. We're 17 ignoring you. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I don't get to ask my 19 question? 20 JUDGE TINLEY: You were asking your question. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. What does the 22 highlight mean, exactly? Is that -- 23 MS. HYDE: The highlights are things that we did 24 not finish and did not agree on. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank you. 11-05-08 wk 19 1 MS. HYDE: That we wanted to talk to -- with y'all. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't have any problem with 3 doing it, 'cause I just -- I mean, that -- I was just asking 4 that. I saw the highlight. My question is basically the 5 same as Buster's. 6 MS. HYDE: Kelly, don't you guys follow DOT right 7 now? Thank you. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: If you had an accident, do 9 you take a drug test after the accident? 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yes, I think is what we're 11 saying. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why don't we take a drug 13 test randomly, once a month? Then we'll know if we got a 14 doper on the staff or not. 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Maybe we are. I hadn't got to 16 that section yet. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: I think -- I think random drug 18 testing is part of the available personnel policy. I think 19 the question that's being raised by that highlighted portion 20 is that if there's -- if there's an accident that -- and, you 21 know, there's either injury or significant damage, either the 22 supervisor or department head would have the authority to 23 require that employee to submit to some sort of drug test. 24 That makes sense. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Yeah. 11-05-08 wk 20 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And I agree. And that 2 includes a -- like, a breathalyzer type thing and DWI? 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Breathalyzer, urinalysis, whatever. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, I'm there. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Drug test refers to alcohol 6 test as well? 7 MS. HYDE: Yeah. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yeah, drug or alcohol. 9 MS. HYDE: Drug or alcohol. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. But, I mean, you have to 11 say drug or alcohol, or can you just say drug. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'd say drug or alcohol. 13 MS. HARGIS: In the last sentence, you got the 14 department head must forward a copy of the accident report to 15 Human Resources. I have to get a copy of that as well. 16 MS. HYDE: It says County Auditor and Human 17 Resources. 18 MS. HARGIS: It says you just notify me; you don't 19 send me a copy of the report. 20 MS. HYDE: Do you want a copy of the report? 21 MS. HARGIS: I have to send a copy of the report to 22 TAC. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Insurance. 24 MS. HYDE: Okay, then we can take out Human 25 Resources and just send it directly to the Auditor. 11-05-08 wk 21 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Where is this at? 2 MS. HYDE: Or they can bring it to me and we'll 3 burn a copy, put it in their files, and then it can go to the 4 Auditor. 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think that's a good way to 6 do it. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Where are we on that? 8 MS. HYDE: Page 29, first sentence, where it 9 says -- 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Supplements. 11 MS. HYDE: In the big one. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: In the big one, 29. 13 MS. HYDE: Page 29 at the very top, just where it 14 says to Human Resources, and then I'll burn a copy of it and 15 give the original to the Auditor. 16 MR. EMERSON: Why don't you just copy it to both 17 entities instead of creating another step in the procedure? 18 MS. HYDE: She'll have to have the original. If 19 she has to file it with insurance, she needs the original. 20 MS. HARGIS: They can just make a copy for you and 21 send me the original. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I'm kind of like Rex; why don't 23 you just say that here? Give a copy to H.R. and forward the 24 original to the Auditor. 25 MS. HYDE: That's what I'm putting now. 11-05-08 wk 22 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That way we'll have 2 documentation. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I didn't mean to jump into the 4 middle of the whole document. I mean, I just -- is it -- I 5 mean -- 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, you did. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right, but I didn't mean to. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Did you stumble in there, or how'd 9 you get there? 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I was just jumping through that 11 one; I took that one and read it. A lot of this stuff is -- 12 is more -- I'll be quiet. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You know what might be -- I 14 don't -- I only speak for myself. What might be more helpful 15 would be this supplementary document that you gave us, right? 16 That was in that book -- green book. If you could just give 17 us the sense of the change between old and new. It goes back 18 to Commissioner Baldwin's question a while ago, so if there's 19 a real -- if the sense of the change that's come back from 20 your discussion with the department heads is some sort of 21 substantial change, just give us the sense of that. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think -- I mean -- 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: One of the major changes 24 that's been made, I think it's pretty consistent throughout 25 this whole document, it throws everything back to our 11-05-08 wk 23 1 approval, rather than it just all of a sudden happen. 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. I mean -- 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, I saw that. 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't -- 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: One of the things that I -- 6 we were involved in going through this. That's one of the -- 7 one of the major things is, instead of it being up to that 8 department head or elected official, it's up to the 9 Commissioners Court to make some of those decisions. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It needs to be. We need to 11 not have -- 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That was what -- 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- 20 different people 14 making changes we don't know about. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's right, and that's why 16 the language in a lot of places is like that. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think I originally was one of 18 the ones that asked for the -- I think the cheat sheet, or 19 the changes, and after receiving it, I wish I hadn't asked 20 that, because I don't think it's of any value. I think we 21 just need to go off the new documents. I think we throw -- 22 put the old one somewhere else and just go through this page 23 by page, section by section, or whatever works, and not worry 24 about the old document any more. Because the old one is so 25 obsolete, we need to, obviously, go off the new one. 11-05-08 wk 24 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Fine by me. 3 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's why I didn't keep my 4 copy. 5 MS. HYDE: Do you want me to give you some of the 6 things? The -- the 12 days to 6 on sick days. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Okay. You can just give us the 8 sections, if it's easier. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, it's in there. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Go to the six days. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have -- real quick, there 12 was a document back when the meetings were done, the one 13 meeting I was at and Rex was at, and there are some changes, 14 such as -- just little ones, you know, and we're noticing 15 them, where it says that, like, the department head will 16 always check with Sheriff's office on driving records. That 17 was changed at these meetings. Most of all the changes that 18 everybody agreed to at the one meeting I was at are not 19 incorporated in this print of 10/30. 20 MS. HYDE: What are you talking about? 21 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And Rex had a document with 22 all the notes out beside it, but they are not in what has 23 been issued to anybody. 24 MS. HYDE: What? 25 MS. PIEPER: That's 'cause at the next meeting that 11-05-08 wk 25 1 you didn't show up, we went back and rediscussed it. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Did Rex not show up either? 3 MS. HYDE: No, or Ilse. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Because the problem is, the 5 ones we're talking about that aren't incorporated are -- I 6 can't run driver's license checks on everybody in the county. 7 MS. HYDE: What page are you on, Rusty? 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It was on that same one below 9 it, 29. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You can, but you don't have 11 enough time? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, I don't have the authority 13 just to do it as a county employee. I do not have the 14 authority to run a DL check. There's a procedure you have to 15 go through Austin to get those driving records on a county 16 employee, okay? I don't have that authority. And that was 17 talked about and it was changed, and it doesn't reflect any 18 of that in these -- in these new issues. 19 MS. HYDE: Okay. What's another one? 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, wait. Wait, let's 21 stay on one thing just for a moment. What -- is that 3.15 22 you're talking about? 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 24 MS. HYDE: Yeah. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Are y'all drawing an "X" 11-05-08 wk 26 1 through this that are we totally deleting and eliminating 2 that? 3 MS. HYDE: The sentence, "department heads will 4 periodically check through the Sheriff's Office," he says 5 they can't do it. It's the second sentence. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What about the rest of the 7 paragraph, though? 8 MS. HYDE: Did you have any other notes on it? 9 MR. EMERSON: Well, I have notes all over the 10 place, but apparently none of them are applicable, so I'm 11 going to sit here and keep my mouth shut. 12 MS. HYDE: What else? 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay, then I need one question 14 answered real quick, and I'll keep mine -- since some of 15 these things have changed from last time. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Contract -- 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let somebody answer this 18 thing. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I need for my department, 20 whether it's jail, clerical, dispatch, deputies -- will any 21 at all of these policies in this policy manual affect a 22 single one of my employees, or do I bring y'all my three 23 policy manuals and we work that out separately? 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Three policy manuals? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have a clerical policy 11-05-08 wk 27 1 manual, I have a jail policy manual, and I have a deputy 2 policy manual. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: By law. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The way I have to do all mine. 5 No, everything's so different; requirements are different. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Do you have a complete set of 7 personnel policies in effect for the members of your 8 department? 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: That has been promulgated by your 11 department? 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, I have a complete set 13 of -- 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Were yours approved by 15 Commissioners Court, and any amendments addressed by 16 Commissioners Court? 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Is that just by past 19 practice, or is that by law? 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's by law, an elected 21 official. By the elected official. The -- one of the things 22 that the Commissioners Court can control in my department is 23 benefits, okay? Everything else -- mine goes into a whole 24 lot more. Mine goes into dress code, to language, to 25 practices, to all -- all kinds of stuff, okay? And a long 11-05-08 wk 28 1 time ago, it was separated out when I did have a policy 2 manual that was adopted by this Court, and then we've had to 3 update it, 'cause I had to get all my jail ones redone and 4 re-updated by the state. And -- but what I'm talking about 5 is, there's so much of this at this point that are conflicts 6 with mine, and what we had talked about before in the 7 meeting, put it all in the same line. But now that has been 8 changed, evidently, where I couldn't come to a meeting, 9 didn't know about one or whatever, okay. The issue was -- 10 'cause I only made it to one meeting; that's the only meeting 11 I ever was advised of. But that's my -- my problem now is, 12 if -- if I'm going to be part of this, then I'm like 13 everybody else. I'm in the dark. It affects a whole lot of 14 my employees that I'm not ready to address, because it's 15 changed from what -- when Rex and us were making all these 16 notes on it. If it's not going to affect anybody with my -- 17 under -- under the Sheriff's Office or jail, then that's 18 fine. I -- I don't need to get involved in it, and it's just 19 y'all, and we'll discuss these. 20 MS. HYDE: You're not going to have benefits or 21 payroll or insurance. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'm not saying that, okay? 23 But I'm just saying there's a lot of things that are changing 24 that I'm not aware of, that you're showing in this stuff that 25 I had never been aware of, and I need -- I would like to know 11-05-08 wk 29 1 that beforehand. That will affect drastically, you know, 2 employees. 3 MS. HYDE: Like what? 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, number one, it's just -- 5 like, half these changes that Rex has highlighted are the 6 ones that we had all talked about, and they aren't in here. 7 There's going to be a whole lot of stuff -- 8 MS. HYDE: What, Rex? 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- about overtime, about the 10 pay of overtime, how they can build it up, if we're going to 11 start paying overtime immediately after 40 hours a week. Law 12 enforcement is different, 'cause it goes up to 171 hours in a 13 pay period. But if you're going to pay it, then my 14 department's overtime has to be quadrupled, because I cannot 15 do that, and y'all cannot afford to pay it out immediately. 16 It just -- you know, holiday time we put in a bank because of 17 it. We just don't have the capability to give that many 18 people off. It's a miracle if we have four on duty. I'm not 19 complaining. Budget-wise, this thing's going be to be major 20 if a lot of these changes are made. And if you're going to 21 start paying the sick leave, it's going to be a major 22 budgetary impact, or vacation. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I think it's always been 24 understood that the Sheriff's Office is a separate animal. I 25 mean, why are we having the discussion? I'm not sure. 11-05-08 wk 30 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, the old policy also -- 2 in the old one, the Sheriff's Office had, even before I took 3 office, said that health insurance took effect 30 days after 4 the employee went to work. Okay? This policy -- and the 5 other one in the county says health insurance takes effect 60 6 or 90 days after the employee goes to work. There's a major 7 conflict in it. 8 MS. HYDE: The insurance changes? 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If it's going to be worked 10 out, it's got to be -- we've got to be consistent. 11 MS. HYDE: The insurance changed this year, 12 January 1 of this year. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: From 30 days? 14 MS. HYDE: Yes. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That it takes effect to 90? 16 MS. HYDE: Yes. Nancy and I have talked about it 17 several times. She said she's talked to you about it, about 18 changing your policy. That was by court order. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: We have, and those are things 20 that just -- that's one example. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think this -- I mean, I think 22 the way -- a couple things. To me, I think that any things 23 like insurance, that's the same for all employees. It needs 24 to be deleted from your policy completely and referred to 25 this policy. 11-05-08 wk 31 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well -- 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Because, otherwise, we get this 3 type of situation. We're going to change the health 4 insurance policy, which we have authority over in here, and 5 you're not going to hear it, and your policy manual will 6 be -- is going to be different. You just need to delete 7 those types of things from your policy, keep all the other 8 stuff that is what you all use as, like, the -- 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I don't mind incorporating 10 them into my policy if that's -- if those are the ones. And 11 that's what Eva and I normally had talked about, is those 12 would be the only policies that would be joint. 'Cause 13 benefits for my employees should be the same for every 14 employee. 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: All you need is a reference 16 in yours that says, for employee benefits, see such and such. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: County personnel policy. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, the problem we had had 19 in the past was -- is the Sheriff's Office had their policy 20 manual; Barbara Nemec had her policy manual. When a new 21 employee was hired, Barbara Nemec issued the new employee 22 that policy manual, Sheriff's Office issued them their policy 23 manual, and it created a nightmare. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Well, that was then and 25 this is now. 11-05-08 wk 32 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's what I'm saying. I 2 don't want to issue them one of the green manuals if y'all 3 are going to do -- 'cause it covers a lot of the other drug 4 testing stuff, which is totally different. 5 MS. HYDE: We haven't -- and you know we haven't 6 given any of your employees the green book. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: All I'm saying -- 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I don't want it adopted that 9 way. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But you shouldn't have your own 11 health -- you need to do just exactly what Bill said. When 12 you get to your health insurance, see county policy. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Period. 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Period. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: There may be some areas in our -- 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: In your -- 17 JUDGE TINLEY: -- in our general policy that -- 18 that may need to be referenced to, and in certain areas; for 19 example, the compensatory -- compensatory time, things of 20 that nature, for Sheriff's Department employees. 21 MS. HYDE: And the JDC. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Guidelines will be as set forth 23 in -- in the -- that particular policy, -- 24 MS. HYDE: Mm-hmm. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The amount of vacation -- 11-05-08 wk 33 1 JUDGE TINLEY: -- cross-referencing this. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Amount of time changes from 3 one year to another, that's major. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Mm-hmm. 5 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The amount of vacation hours 6 carried from one year to another. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That should be the same 8 county-wide. Why should you be different? 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Because how are you going -- 10 when I have employees, okay, and you're working five officers 11 per shift, normally you're going to have four with one off 12 duty. And you've got employees that have been there 20 13 years, and they're getting four weeks of vacation a year, all 14 right? And you can't give them four weeks of vacation a year 15 to keep people on the road. You don't have enough manpower 16 to allow them to take that much time off. We try and force 17 them to. We try and get them, you know, in slow times, but 18 it just doesn't happen. And they're going to build up that 19 time, and what they do is, at the end of the year, all of a 20 sudden, they've lost this -- you know, whatever extra hours 21 they've had. And it's not their fault. They couldn't get 22 approved to take the time off, 'cause they didn't have -- you 23 couldn't do it. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: That could well apply to any other 25 department. That's not necessarily unique to the law 11-05-08 wk 34 1 enforcement arena. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, it doesn't. If you look 3 at the number of hours worked, it will not apply to the other 4 departments. These people are working 24-hour-a-day shifts 5 out there, okay? They're not working 8 hours a day where you 6 have a little bit of overtime here and there at election 7 time. My overtime happens every day. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: Wait a minute. We just shifted from 9 overtime -- from vacation time to overtime. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's all -- when it's overtime 11 and vacation, they don't get -- we try and make them take 12 their overtime off so that they don't build up overtime into 13 a bank or have -- pay for it, 'cause I don't have that kind 14 of overtime budget. When you make them take the overtime 15 off, then they're not using their vacation time. They can't. 16 One of the two. I mean, you've got to -- you've got an issue 17 there on how much time these people can get off. 18 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What do they do with this 19 vacation that they -- 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: We keep track of it and try 21 and let them take it off as we can. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's a liability. 23 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I agree, it is. 24 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I don't think we can, 25 accounting-wise, do that, or legally do that. 11-05-08 wk 35 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Then you're going to have to 2 up my overtime budget drastically, 'cause these -- 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No, just make them take it 4 off. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We have to be able to 6 dispose of it. 7 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Do you want the county to only 8 have one patrolman on duty? 9 JUDGE TINLEY: If that's how you got to schedule. 10 MR. OEHLER: Scheduling thing, Rusty, in my 11 opinion. It's a scheduling thing. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, it's not a scheduling 13 thing. 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: It's your department. It's 15 your responsibility to schedule those people to where we 16 don't build up this kind of a liability. 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Commissioner Oehler, when you 18 have four people on patrol, okay, that's all your patrolmen 19 you have for 1,100 square miles. How many people do you want 20 out there working patrol at a time? I have a rule -- 21 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: How many you've got approved 22 in your budget that you can legally pay and give time off 23 here. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have five people on a shift 25 if it's full and everybody's out there. 11-05-08 wk 36 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That tells me that if you're 2 understaffed, you need to ask for more staff at budget time 3 and take care of that rather than doing what you're doing, 4 because this way it's nothing more than a continuing 5 liability to the -- to Kerr County. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's exactly -- 7 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You're breaking the law. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's exactly right. We try 9 and ask for it, okay? We've asked for more employees. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sure. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You're one of the ones that 12 said it all could get cut. What I'm trying to say is, we're 13 in a circle where you can only do so much if I'm going to 14 provide effective law enforcement. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You know what, Rusty? 16 Everybody has the same problem. It's not unique to your 17 department only. Everybody would like to have more 18 employees, and in your case, you probably need more. If you 19 do need more, you need to ask for them and justify why. This 20 is a -- a good discussion that should have been had at budget 21 time. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. I think it was. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Right. Not now, after you 24 get into a new budget year, then you tell us you can't give 25 these people time off because you don't have enough on -- 11-05-08 wk 37 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Commissioner Oehler, this 2 discussion -- 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: This is your problem. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: This discussion has been had 5 at budget time for the last five years that I know of, all 6 right? I still have to provide the deputies on the street. 7 So, in being able to -- 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: We could have this argument 9 all day long, and it's not going to change. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: -- build up the time -- 11 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, the -- the point that you make 12 is not unique to your department. It occurs with virtually 13 every county department where -- where there are demands on a 14 department. You've got people trying to take off, take 15 vacation time. Oh, no, we've got this to do, that to do, and 16 people end up throughout this county system losing vacation 17 time. Goes with the game. It's -- it's something that all 18 of the department heads and elected officials are going to 19 have to work off. It's that simple. Yours may be a little 20 bit -- little bit more prevalent in your department, but I 21 cannot see where we can allow your people to accumulate 22 vacation time and tell other county departments, "You are 23 going to lose yours and get it chopped off," when somebody 24 else is getting theirs and they can accrue it. I just -- I 25 just can't see -- 11-05-08 wk 38 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'm not disagreeing with you 2 in that, okay? I agree with you in that. But if you're 3 going to make the changes in the policy manual that -- that 4 enforce that county-wide, then all I'm saying is, that change 5 is going to drastically up the County's budget. 6 MS. HYDE: But -- okay. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Have you ever done an 8 analysis at the end of the year or looking back on, say, five 9 years to determine the amount of unused vacation time for 10 your patrol deputies, particularly, that have -- that has not 11 been taken? And know what that converts to in -- 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Sure. 13 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- either in terms of 14 manpower or cash? Have you ever done that analysis? 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I've never seen it. 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I can tell you any day how 18 much vacation time my employees have in their banks, and it 19 is a bad issue, because if they quit today, okay, they get 20 paid at today's pay rate. Which is hard on the County, I 21 agree. But they also -- if they quit today, they only get 22 paid for a maximum of 160; they do automatically lose 23 everything else because of budget constraints, all right? 24 But if they aren't quitting and they're still working, we're 25 still trying -- when I took office, I had employees with over 11-05-08 wk 39 1 1,000 hours of vacation time. I'm still, eight years later, 2 trying to work that down. This is not a problem that has 3 just started. But if you just all of a sudden cut it, okay, 4 then there's a lot of people that have lost a lot. 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, we see there's an issue here, 6 and that's something that we'll have to make a decision on. 7 Next highlight. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Throw your hat first. Throw 9 your hat in the door first. 10 MS. HYDE: I'm telling you. On the merit 11 increases, because we have the performance appraisals that 12 we're going to go over this year with the new people, it's on 13 the next -- it's, like, three or four all dealing with 14 reclasses, merit increases, -- 15 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What page are you on? 16 MS. HYDE: -- all that. It's all precedent -- I 17 mean, it all comes about from the -- 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Performance evals. 19 MS. HYDE: -- performance evaluations that we're 20 going to work on. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Then we need to get 22 together on that pretty quickly, don't we? 23 MS. HYDE: Right. 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 25 MS. HYDE: Because if those work, then those can 11-05-08 wk 40 1 trickle on down to the employees. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 3 MS. HYDE: And that's why all those are kind of 4 highlighted, waiting to see if that works or not. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 6 MS. HYDE: Back on that front page, I don't know if 7 y'all ever answered or not, but that break in service, you're 8 saying 60 or 90? Or are we still discussing? 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Judge said 60, and I agree 10 with that. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: I -- 12 MR. BOLLIER: I agree with the Judge, too. Sixty 13 days. 14 AUDIENCE: I think 60 days is fine. 15 MS. HYDE: So, y'all want me to change it to 60 16 throughout? 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What page? In which 18 document? 19 JUDGE TINLEY: We're dealing off this one. 20 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: This one? 21 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. Change documents; switch 22 quickly here. 23 MS. HYDE: On the new hire wages -- 24 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: While you're on that 25 document, go up to 511 and correct where it says, "continuous 11-05-08 wk 41 1 service mean." Put an "s" there, "means." Before you move 2 off -- 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I knew there was something 4 wrong with that. 5 MS. HYDE: That's in the old one, Commissioner 6 Williams. That's in the old one. I'm not going to retype 7 that one, if that's okay. 511 is old. 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll give you another one. 9 Next page, Page 3, suggested change, last paragraph, take out 10 the apostrophe after "employees," and change, after second 11 line, "transfer" are ineligible. As I see them, I'll tell 12 you about them. 13 (Low-voice discussion off the record.) 14 MS. HYDE: New hire wages. In the old book, there 15 wasn't a whole lot in there about what do you do with new 16 hires, and I think that during the last two years, pretty 17 much all of you have schooled me that although we want to 18 start at a Grade 1, education, experience, skill sets, again, 19 those have to go through Commissioners Court first. And 20 that's all that new hire wages is. So -- and also having a 21 PAC, which is a personnel assignment change form. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 23 MS. HYDE: Same thing on promotions. They need a 24 PAC, but also, if we do the merits, if we do start talking 25 about merit raises, you've got that six months again that 11-05-08 wk 42 1 they're not eligible for merit consideration if there's any 2 sort of promotion or another increase. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Which paragraph were you 4 speaking to? 5 MS. HYDE: 120, Page 4. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: 120, Page 4. Thank you. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Or Page 15 if you're on the 8 other document. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: (Laughter.) Thank you, 10 Jon. Got it. 11 MS. HYDE: Page 5, demotions. The old one kind of 12 left a lot of questions more than answers, so we just 13 tightened up the language. Voluntary and disciplinary 14 demotions always involve a decrease in pay. Otherwise, you 15 don't call it a demotion; it's not really a demotion. A 16 demotion means a decrease. So, it just tightened up the 17 language on that. 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can I ask a question? 19 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: What is that? 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's something Tim's 22 going to fix. 23 MS. HYDE: It's the -- 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Why do we have to listen to 25 that? 11-05-08 wk 43 1 THE CLERK: John Trolinger says it's a cell phone 2 that interferes. 3 MR. BOLLIER: Should have been fixed a couple 4 times. We've tried. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Supposed to be a cell phone 6 that -- 7 JUDGE TINLEY: My cell phone just buzzed. 8 MR. BOLLIER: That's it. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right, throw him out. 10 Let's get to the bottom of this thing. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: I throw others out. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, that's right, I got it 13 backwards. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We need a static filter on 15 that thing or something. 16 MR. BOLLIER: Yes, sir. 17 COMMISSIONER LETZ: What's a PAC? 18 MS. HYDE: Personnel assignment change. 19 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Should I know what that is? 20 Does it say that in here somewhere? 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Political action committee. 22 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's what I thought. I 23 didn't know what that had to do with a promotion. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You can see who the 25 politicians are. 11-05-08 wk 44 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Is that a generic PAC? 2 MS. HYDE: Just -- yeah, it's one that we've been 3 using for about 18 months. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Phone's ringing. Demotion 5 is something that you reduce. All right. Now -- 6 MS. HYDE: What's happened in the past is that 7 we've demoted people, and there's been no real demotion. 8 It's been -- we've kind of finagled where they don't lose any 9 money, or they don't lose anything. And if you demote 10 somebody, it's the opposite of promote. Right? 11 JUDGE TINLEY: When you're going to whack somebody, 12 you need to take some dough away. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, money is the -- 14 MS. HYDE: Money is part of it. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It's not the only thing, 16 though. 17 MS. HYDE: No, sir, it's not the only thing. If 18 they go down a grade -- let's say they're a 15. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Take a title away from them. 20 MS. HYDE: Right. Right, take responsibilities 21 away from them. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Which usually includes 23 money. 24 MS. HYDE: Mm-hmm. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Money's always there, isn't 11-05-08 wk 45 1 it? 2 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We've never -- we've been 3 pretty lax on that. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I don't remember ever doing 5 anything like that. Have we ever done anything -- 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No. If we do anything at 7 all, we bust somebody back and continue to pay them the same 8 thing. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. Or give them a raise 10 for being bad. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No sense at all. 12 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Back to that promotions, -- 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: After last night, you have 14 to -- 15 COMMISSIONER LETZ: -- promotions must be 16 recommended by the employee's supervisor and approved by 17 their department head within the position schedule and budget 18 limits approved by Commissioners Court. The next sentence 19 says, "All promotions subject to Commissioners Court 20 approval." No. If there is an opening in Jannett's 21 department and she's moving one person in that department, 22 like, up a notch, we don't approve that, I don't think. 23 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I think so. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I think we do. 25 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We do? 11-05-08 wk 46 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If you're moving them up, you 2 do. 3 MS. HYDE: We put that back in there because -- 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: We don't approve when they hire 5 them the first time. 6 MS. HYDE: But it's in the budget. 7 COMMISSIONER LETZ: They're in the budget; it's a 8 budgeted slot. If someone retires and she promotes somebody 9 from within to fill that slot, we never see that whole thing. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, you're right about that. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think you're correct, 12 Jon, we don't. 13 MS. HYDE: So, we can mark it out? 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We don't get involved in 15 that. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: If it's a budgeted item, we 17 don't. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Unless -- unless -- unless the 19 position they're promoted to is approved in the current 20 budget. All promotions are subject to Commissioners Court. 21 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right. Now, if -- what comes 22 to us is, if she goes up -- say she's going from a -- this is 23 why they come to us a lot. If they went from a 14-6, they're 24 going up to a 17, they go to a 17-1. If they don't go to a 25 17-1, we have to approve that. That's why they come to us. 11-05-08 wk 47 1 But if it went to a 17-1, we would never see that person. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: What if they're at that 6 3 because of longevity? 4 COMMISSIONER LETZ: That's the same thing. 5 MS. HYDE: Well, there's discussion about the 6 longevity, so let's just go ahead and throw it out there, 7 Rusty. The longevity is -- for example, if you have a 8 promotion and someone is a 15 -- no, I'll just go ahead and 9 use a 21.5-5, which means a 21.5 -- a 21.5 is a deputy, and 10 they're at 5 because they're a master deputy. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, not this -- not that, just 12 the longevity. 13 MS. HYDE: Fine, then. They've been here for a 14 long time, and they're at number 5, but, you know, they get 15 promoted to lieutenant, and that's a 28. So, what has been 16 going on is that we take them from a 21.5-5 to a 28. Instead 17 of going from one, we take them and keep the longevity, and 18 take them to 28-5, which is a huge increase. If you're 19 promoting someone, then you can promote them up through the 20 grades, and not necessarily keep the longevity, because the 21 longevity number is -- is a moot point at that point, because 22 now they've gotten a promotion and their longevity should be 23 able to start over if you want it to. 24 MS. PIEPER: That's what I thought. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Why do you want to stop the 11-05-08 wk 48 1 progression of a person? Because these -- these step and 2 grades were based upon a 20-year service level. And most of 3 our employees -- 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Are you suggesting that if 5 somebody got promoted from sergeant to lieutenant that is at 6 the top of the grade, a sergeant with "X" number of years, 20 7 years or whatever, and they got promoted to lieutenant, are 8 we saying those 20 years have gone down the drain? 9 MS. HYDE: No, sir. What you're saying is that 10 they are going up. If that 20 -- if they're already at -- 11 they're at a 12, and they've already -- they've got all their 12 time in, you want to put them out on a 12, and they're making 13 $40,000, and now you're going to promote them three grades or 14 four grades up, then that same thing is going to be a 5 or a 15 6 of the following grade, not the 12. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: So, you're making a 17 distinction in this case between what you just said and 18 service -- length of service. 19 MS. HYDE: Right. Because you don't want -- you 20 don't want to harm the employee. Why -- why put them all the 21 way out there on the end again? You promoted them, and 22 they're done again. They can't do anything else. They can't 23 continue to grow. And that's what longevity was supposed to 24 be all about. Right now, our longevity stops at 20 years; 25 you're done unless you get promoted. 11-05-08 wk 49 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: There has to be a clear, 2 concise definition of the distinction -- 3 MS. HYDE: Right. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- between the length of 5 service within a grade or length of service to Kerr County, 6 and being at the top of a grade. 7 MS. HYDE: Right. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And that's a -- that's the key 9 point. Because what you're doing -- the step and grade is -- 10 like she said, it's based on 20 years. Say you have a person 11 that's been here 18 years. At 18 years, he's almost at the 12 end of the step and grade. Now you're going to promote him 13 up, okay? And if you promote him up to a -- to a lieutenant, 14 whatever, he misses -- even if it's a regular county 15 employee, but you make him go all the way back, or back 16 equivalent, instead of saying he's at this step and grade; go 17 up to a 12 or whatever. And you move him back to an 8 to 18 make it to where it's kind of equivalent and gets a little 19 raise, but not a full one. Now, all of a sudden, he's got -- 20 instead of 20 years maxing out, now he's got 20-plus going 21 back up to the -- the Grade 12 in that. He needs to go 22 straight up so that he's still at his length of years, which 23 maxes out. And if he's promoted up and he's already at a -- 24 if he's at a 21-12 as a patrolman, say, and he goes up to a 25 lieutenant, and now he's at a 25-12, well, he's still maxed 11-05-08 wk 50 1 out. So what if he's not going to get any more raises? He's 2 maxed out because of his longevity. That's what he's -- 3 that's what maxed him out in the county's step and grade. 4 Otherwise, you're going to give the County more liability, 5 because now you're going to move him up even more. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: No, you -- 7 MS. HYDE: More liability immediately. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Give him more years. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: As opposed to letting him continue 10 to earn liability -- continue to earn more with his 11 longevity. If you take him up two grades, you're going to 12 back him off two steps, effectively, the way I understand the 13 way -- the way it's calculated. That will give him two more 14 to work towards. But if you immediately take him up to the 15 same number of steps because he stopped there, you're just 16 giving him a one-time 5 percent or 7 and a half or 10 -- 17 wherever he's moving to. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But -- 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's look at the flip, though -- 20 wait a second, Rusty. But if you do what y'all are saying, 21 and you -- he goes up to a 28-1 then, and say Rusty decides 22 he doesn't like him as a lieutenant, then he puts him back 23 down to a sergeant again, who's going to keep track of 24 recalculating his length of service all of a sudden again? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: His length of service should 11-05-08 wk 51 1 follow him from day one with this county, regardless of where 2 he's working, all the way through. He's getting -- the 3 longevity is for his years of being an employee for Kerr 4 County. If he transfers from the Clerk's office to mine or 5 whatever, it shouldn't matter. The longevity is for the 6 years of service with the county; it should never go 7 backwards, regardless of what grade he's at. 8 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I think that's what we -- you 9 know, I don't know whether it's working real well, and we 10 probably didn't think it through when we adopted it. The 11 intent was to reward length of service and keep employees in 12 the county. 13 MS. HYDE: Right. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: What's -- what's the whole purpose 15 of awarding for longevity? Money. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The loyalty -- well, plus -- 17 it is money, when it comes to that, but it's -- it's awarding 18 that employee for his loyalty for staying with this county 19 for that long. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. If you -- if the whole 21 purpose and intent is to -- is to give him monetary increases 22 because of length of service, now if you're going to increase 23 someone from a 28-12, and you're going to reclassify him as 24 an employee at the same rate of pay, don't you have to, 25 depending on how far up you go, back him off some steps? 11-05-08 wk 52 1 MS. BOLIN: Yes. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But you don't back him off 3 because of his years of service. He should always keep his 4 years of service. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I agree. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: We're going to reward him again for 7 his length -- for his years of service when we jumped him up 8 in the same step, then. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The years of service are equal 10 throughout every step and grade, okay? It's just you 11 promoted him up to a higher grade because he earned a 12 promotion. You don't back him down from his years of 13 service. 14 MS. BOLIN: But if you look in the step and grade, 15 Rusty -- 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You have to look at it -- 17 MS. HYDE: You have to watch it, because the 18 promotions, when do you stuff like that, depending on what 19 grade they are, that raise can be anywhere from $3,000 to 20 $6,000. So, you know, are you being consistent and fair and 21 using parity when you do promotions? 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think we're getting into 23 a discussion of semantics here in terms of length of service. 24 MS. HYDE: Length of service doesn't change. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's time that an 11-05-08 wk 53 1 individual spends working for Kerr County. 2 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: If you get into the step 4 and grade, you're talking about time in grade. Now, why 5 don't we separate this thing? 6 MS. HYDE: That's right. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Time in grade versus length 8 of service. 9 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: The maximum length of service 11 you can obtain is up to a seven; one your first year, and 12 then it's every three years. If you go up to over -- based 13 on 20 years, you can never get to an eight. I mean, you 14 can -- 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Correct. 16 COMMISSIONER LETZ: I mean, it's a -- 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's right, because the rest 18 of it would be the merit raises or the education. 19 MS. HYDE: What the order states is there were 20 seven or eight. You can make eight, and the other four in 21 there, so that the department head can, at their discretion, 22 give four merit increases at any time with no discussion. 23 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You lose those -- to me, you 24 lose all the merits, but you keep the longevity. 25 MS. HYDE: You're still getting longevity, but you 11-05-08 wk 54 1 -- you allow that person to increase the -- their role in 2 longevity. And it's length of service, not time in grade. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's where the 4 distinction has to be, and everybody has to understand it. 5 COMMISSIONER LETZ: See, I -- but if you go with a 6 lot of positions -- I mean, if you get down to more like the 7 14's and the 15's and 16's, they're going to take a pay cut 8 when they get a promotion. 9 MS. HYDE: No. No. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: You can go from a -- you're 11 going to go from a 14 -- 12 MS. HYDE: That's why we come to y'all and say, 13 "This is where they need to be." 14 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, that's the policy. Why 15 make it a policy? They have to come from us. If you're 16 going from a 14-10 and then you're going up to a 15-1, that's 17 a pay cut. 18 MS. HYDE: That's a pay cut. But you would never 19 do that, 'cause that's not a promotion. 20 COMMISSIONER LETZ: But it is -- going from a 14 to 21 a 15 is a promotion. 22 MS. BOLIN: What you do is a line-out -- you do a 23 lateral line-out, though, Commissioner, and you can -- you 24 can match your 14-12 with -- I think it's a 15-6 or 25 something. 11-05-08 wk 55 1 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Right, you can do that, but 2 that's not a promotion either. 3 MS. HYDE: And then you bump them up. 4 MS. BOLIN: You go up to the 15, then you can go up 5 a step. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: This does it, one step. 7 MS. BOLIN: They don't lose their longevity. They 8 don't lose their years of service. It's just -- it goes like 9 this, and then you have these steps that you can do. 10 COMMISSIONER LETZ: Well, you really -- you lose 11 your longevity. You just kind of -- it works out. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I just -- I think -- and 13 people in my department, people look at those steps. If they 14 think they've got -- this is the longevity policy, and this 15 is how many steps up there are for longevity. And then I 16 promote them up, but move them back, they say, "What happened 17 to my longevity? Yeah, I got a raise, but what happened to 18 my longevity?" 19 (Commissioner Letz left the courtroom.) 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Rusty, does your man care if he is a 21 28-12 or a -- a 32-8, if the money's the same? 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: And he's -- and he's moving into a 24 new slot where he has the ability to gain advancement? 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Yes, because the way he's 11-05-08 wk 56 1 looking at it, if he was a 28-12 because of longevity, he was 2 at that 12 because of his length of service, and if you move 3 him up to a 32, then because of his length of service, he 4 should be a 32-12. If you take him back to a 32 -- 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: No. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: You're rewarding him twice for that 7 length of time. 8 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: You are -- you're doing it 9 twice. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: He says, "You promoted me, but 11 you took away my length of service." 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Doesn't have anything to do 13 with it. You're talking about pay. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: No, that -- the step and grade is 15 not a longevity trail, it's a compensation grid. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If you look at the step and 17 grade and the longevity policy the County has adopted, it is 18 a step, and it does say one step. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Maybe we need to change it. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: In the step and grade, one for 21 this year, one step for every three years after that. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think we have to clarify 23 what I said earlier, the distinction between length of 24 service and time in grade. 25 MS. HYDE: Time in grade. 11-05-08 wk 57 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Two things. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: As long as you can, then fine. 3 Otherwise, I have them come to me. They feel like, "What 4 happened to all my longevity?" 5 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Maybe they don't understand. 6 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Probably some don't. 7 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Got any more highlights for 8 us, Ms. Hyde? 9 MS. HYDE: On Page 7 in that 38-page thing, -- 10 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. 11 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Page 7. 12 MS. HYDE: -- can you mark out failure to give a -- 13 it's bold and underlining -- underlined. Can you please mark 14 that out, "failure to give 14-day notice?" Just mark it out. 15 That's illegal. We tried; we can't do it. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: We don't want to do that. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Can't make it mandatory. 18 MS. HYDE: No, sir, we can't make it mandatory. 19 Rex -- Rex says we can't. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Next highlight? 21 MS. HYDE: On Page 9, -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 23 MS. HYDE: -- you need to look at the categories of 24 employment. Those are different. And Page 10. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's see. We have a 11-05-08 wk 58 1 regular full-time person -- 2 MS. HYDE: Mm-hmm. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- and we have a regular 4 part-time person. 5 MS. HYDE: Mm-hmm. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now, I've only been arguing 7 this for 16 years. 8 MS. HYDE: Oh, no. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So this is kind of fresh for 10 me. 11 MS. HYDE: Okay. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And a part-time employee 13 does not get benefits because they work less than 19 and a 14 half hours. Different hours for you. 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'm not saying a word. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, don't say anything. 17 (Laughter.) Nineteen -- less than. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: It's really not, but I'm not 19 saying anything. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Thank God. I love y'all. 21 Y'all love me. Less than 19 hours is not a full-time 22 employee. Therefore, they don't get benefits, correct? Or 23 incorrect? 24 JUDGE TINLEY: Incorrect. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now -- and then we have 11-05-08 wk 59 1 another -- okay, what is a temporary full/part-time in the 2 suggested change? 3 MS. HYDE: Because a temporary employee is supposed 4 to be someone that is hired with a specific job to be 5 completed within a specific time frame, no more -- not to 6 exceed 12 months. And we use temporary, and the word 7 "temporary" for a lot of things, so we're just trying to 8 clean up what we're using. 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Now, is that a 10 part-time employee? 11 MS. HYDE: It can be full-time or part-time. 12 They're temporary, which means they have no position. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Do they get benefits? 14 MS. HYDE: No. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. So, they're probably 16 a part-time employee, and -- in my mind. 17 MS. HYDE: And then -- and we added the vocational 18 intern, which are free intern students that we can get, and 19 then casual employees. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, one -- yeah, I see that 21 casual thing. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Means they show up with baggy -- 23 baggy shorts hanging down below their knees. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Tennis shoes. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Flip-flops. 11-05-08 wk 60 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Flip-flops. 2 MS. HYDE: Those are more like the election workers 3 that come in and help set up early, you know, like early 4 voting. It's intermittent. It's very casual. They fall 5 outside the normal rules of payroll. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, I'm going to leave it 7 alone. Thank you. 8 MS. HYDE: Are you sure? 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yes. 10 MS. HYDE: Okay. You said it was 16 years, so I 11 was ready. 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I'll be back next year. 13 MS. HYDE: Okay. We added some solicitation 14 language. There wasn't anything in there. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Oh, boy. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: You got to stop. 17 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I told you we have to stop 18 that stuff. (Laughter.) Where is that? 19 MS. HYDE: Page 13. 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wait a minute, what is this 21 all about? Now, if I -- I don't -- I don't ever come up here 22 and advertise things I'm doing, but let's pretend I did. And 23 there is going to be a fantastic play at the Point Theatre 24 cranking up in a couple weeks, and they have a great bass 25 player in the band. Great bass player, and I'm not going to 11-05-08 wk 61 1 tell you who it is because you'll think that I'm promoting 2 something, or myself. (Laughter.) And I want to bring a 3 flyer that promotes it. It's totally outside -- outside the 4 county system. Are you telling me I can't do that? 5 MS. HYDE: You just submit it to your department 6 head for approval, and if approved, the department head signs 7 it and you post it. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. That one's going up, 9 then. I'm the department head. 10 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I guess you're the department 11 head approving your own sign. 12 MS. HYDE: You're the boss. 13 MS. ROMAN: If someone's kids or grandkids or 14 somebody is selling cookies, we can't go to the Sheriff's 15 Department or the Commissioners or department heads? 16 JUDGE TINLEY: You'd have to bring the cookies in 17 for -- for testing and approval. (Laughter.) In large 18 quantities, I might add. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now you're talking. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Especially for the Judge. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You're referring to the poor 22 little starving children that we all need to help. I -- now, 23 wait a minute. So, is that -- 24 MS. ROMAN: Because, I mean, people do it all the 25 time. I mean, and -- 11-05-08 wk 62 1 MS. HYDE: Raffle tickets. 2 MS. ROMAN: -- you've bought stuff from our kids, 3 Buster. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I buy them all the time. I 5 want to know why I can't do that. 6 MS. HYDE: Could people coming in with doughnuts, 7 or coming in with food and selling food throughout the 8 courthouse -- 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, we're not going to allow 10 that to happen any more? 11 MS. HYDE: If y'all decide we're going to put this 12 in, no, I guess not. Or it's up to the department heads. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah, it's up to the 14 department heads. If we choose to allow our employees' 15 children to come in and sell the things which they have been 16 doing since Noah's Ark, then we can allow that to happen in 17 Commissioners Court, right? 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 20 MS. ROMAN: But if -- 21 MS. HYDE: Say that again, Rex? I'm going to put 22 you on the spot. 23 MR. EMERSON: I said if you read the policy, as 24 long as it's during lunch breaks or breaks, it's legal. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: What if I don't want to eat 11-05-08 wk 63 1 a cookie during lunch, or -- 2 MS. HYDE: It's not just cookies; it's selling -- 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If you want to try to sell 4 your kid's school candy during lunch or break, it's fine if 5 they're raising money. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Are we going to talk 7 about -- 8 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: All of us have done what 9 Buster's talking about, brought raffle tickets in for an 10 organization that we have an interest in and things of that 11 nature. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: This is saying you can't do 13 that. You can't do that unless you're doing it on your lunch 14 break. 15 MS. ROMAN: Well, and I agree with that. That 16 means that you're doing personal stuff on county time. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, right. 18 MS. ROMAN: If you do it on your break and do it on 19 lunch break, then there's not a problem, but if you're doing 20 it on county time, then you're not doing your job. 21 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I'll remember that. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wait. She's talking 23 about -- you're talking about our employees bringing it in 24 and selling them for the kid? Oh, I see. 25 MS. ROMAN: Right. 11-05-08 wk 64 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I see. God, we can get 2 more -- 3 MS. ROMAN: And I just got told to shut up, so 4 let's move on. 5 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: At what point do we talk 6 about what a break is? 7 JUDGE TINLEY: We don't. That's out. That's how 8 you make it happen, if you want to make it happen. You don't 9 define "break." 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: If the question is asked, "Why are 12 they doing that?" "Well, it's on break, so it's okay." 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Can you delete the last 15 14 minutes? 15 THE REPORTER: Wish I could. 16 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: She'd love to. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Moving right along. 18 MS. PIEPER: So, are we leaving it in or taking it 19 out? 20 MS. HYDE: I don't think they've made a decision. 21 This is just talking. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Don't try to stop the kids 23 from coming down here and selling me some cookies and raffle 24 tickets. 25 MS. PIEPER: We need to take it out and go on. 11-05-08 wk 65 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay, take it out, whatever. 2 MS. HYDE: Are we taking it out? 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I am. 4 (Low-voice discussion off the record.) 5 JUDGE TINLEY: I think we need to be able to say we 6 got a policy where you can't do this if some outsider walks 7 in here and is -- 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's fine. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: -- peddling lord knows what. 10 MR. BOLLIER: We got somebody trying to sell 11 tamales about once a month. I have no idea who it is. 12 MS. PIEPER: They're good, too. 13 MR. BOLLIER: I do it every time, tell them to go. 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They may be good tamales. 15 MS. PIEPER: They are. 16 JUDGE TINLEY: Obviously, he's selling them on 17 break time, right? (Laughter.) 18 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's try these tamales out 19 before you get too carried away. 20 MS. HYDE: If you go to Page 20, there was going to 21 be a -- 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Page 20. 23 MS. HYDE: This is going to be -- we're going to 24 request the vacation, but due to budget constraints, it 25 reverted right back to where it is; there is no change, just 11-05-08 wk 66 1 some wording change. And on this page, mark out the 14-day 2 notice. 3 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There went the Judge again. 4 MS. BOLIN: Who is it? Buster, are you going off? 5 (Laughter.) 6 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Got your pacemaker there? 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: About 7:15 this morning. 8 And -- 9 JUDGE TINLEY: We don't need to know, Buster. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, no, no. We're going to 11 have to wait till tonight. No, it's not me. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Spare us the details, 13 please. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Twice in one day is all I 15 can do. (Laughter.) 16 MS. HYDE: Oh, lord. 17 MS. BOLIN: I apologize; that did not come out 18 right. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's right. You got me 20 mixed up with my brother, obviously. 21 MS. HYDE: On Page 20, mark out the failure both 22 times. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. 24 MS. HYDE: It should be marked out, but I don't 25 know if it's marked out on y'all's. 11-05-08 wk 67 1 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yes, mine is. 2 MS. HYDE: And then that vacation cap, I don't want 3 to open that damn thing up again, please. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No more vacation. 5 MS. HYDE: Sick leave. This is based on if you 6 change it to 6 days per year. Right now it's at 12. 7 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let me ask you a question, 8 though, just for fun. At 12, do -- is there a lot of folks 9 that use all 12? 10 (Ms. Hyde nodded.) 11 MR. BOLLIER: Six days? 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, what would be the 13 reasoning for us to go back, then? To -- to demote? 14 MS. HYDE: Because they're not using it as sick 15 days. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Well, that's a different 17 story, then. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Because they use it to keep 19 from having to take vacation time. They burn it for 20 different things. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's a no-no in my book. 22 MS. HYDE: I understand that, but you can't prove 23 it. And because the -- how do you prove -- say I call in 24 with a migraine, and I'm only out one day, so I don't have to 25 bring a doctor's excuse. Which is in here, which you -- 11-05-08 wk 68 1 after two days, they have to have a doctor's excuse. But we 2 have a lot of employees that, when they earn them, they use 3 every second they have as soon as they earn it. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Now -- and so we're -- we're 5 in the position -- or you're in the position to guess whether 6 they're being honest or not. 7 MS. HYDE: Yeah. But I guess -- 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wait, wait. 9 MS. HYDE: -- this man can't back me up. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Please don't get him in on 11 this. 12 MS. HYDE: Rex? 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: No, I thought you was 14 pointing to Rusty. 15 MS. HYDE: Right now, I -- 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, we're guessing whether 17 these people are really sick or not. And so that, you know 18 -- you know, we are possibly hurting people by taking away 19 half their sick day -- taking away some sick days from them, 20 that really do use them for what they're intended for. So, 21 aren't we hurting somebody -- possibly hurting somebody? Or 22 are we -- you agree with anything that I'm talking about? 23 JUDGE TINLEY: The one you didn't mind getting in 24 wants to get in. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I know it. I saw that head 11-05-08 wk 69 1 bob. 2 MR. EMERSON: I want to give you a hypothetical. 3 Hypothetically speaking, there might have been a county 4 employee who used to get sick once a month, and it always 5 happened to occur on the day after ladies night. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I can understand that. 7 MR. EMERSON: Now, how do I prove -- how do I prove 8 the employee is not sick? 9 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I don't know. 10 MR. EMERSON: There's a significant impact on 11 productivity. 12 MS. HYDE: But it's also -- when we talked about it 13 in the group, this is where sometimes you don't -- I mean, we 14 talked about they get one per month, and so you get 12 sick 15 days. We got 13 holidays; we have vacation. That's pretty 16 -- pretty good. And when you look at the numbers, we got a 17 whole lot more using everything they get than not, so the 18 argument when I first came here was, don't touch the sick 19 time, because that's what we have to have, 'cause we don't 20 have long-term and short-term disability if somebody gets 21 hurt. Well, unfortunately -- 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Because -- and they admitted 23 that we used that for other purposes? 24 MS. HYDE: Right. So, part of -- part of what I'm 25 supposed to be looking at, I reckon, is ways that we can 11-05-08 wk 70 1 improve some things. Well, I feel like six days is good. 2 Now, other people might not. But when we discussed it, there 3 didn't seem to be a big outcry of no. What the outcry was, 4 don't limit them and don't take anything away from them. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Don't limit them in terms 6 of what? 7 MS. HYDE: What they've already earned. So, when 8 we talked about the short-term and the long-term disability, 9 that was where -- I mean, I thought I needed Kevlar again, 10 because I made the mistake of saying, "All right, we pay them 11 out and they're done, and that's all they earn." Holy 12 crudola. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Yeah. 14 MS. HYDE: Crudola, c-r-u-d -- 15 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The six days -- I have a major 16 problem with that, because people will -- ladies night or 17 whatever, they'll use sick leave. 18 MS. HYDE: Men's night. 19 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Men's night, yeah. I've got a 20 few of those, too. Whatever -- but they do, and they end up 21 using sick leave and never use up the other. That's 22 constantly building up, causing me more problems. Plus then, 23 at this point -- 24 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: There's the vacation problem. 25 MS. HYDE: Well, yeah. I'm going to -- wait a 11-05-08 wk 71 1 minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait. Time, please. 2 JUDGE TINLEY: Hold it. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Bruce? 4 MS. HYDE: Wait, please. I'm going to take up for 5 him just a tad. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No, I agree with you, Bruce. 7 MS. HYDE: In that vacation thing with you. When 8 we -- okay. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Let the Sheriff finish. He was -- 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: In this, Bruce, I do agree 11 with you in part of that, okay? I'm not -- 12 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Hey, I like that. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'm not disagreeing with that, 14 because it does happen. We have employees that do that. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sure. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And it does affect it. And 17 where we dis -- and that's where I totally agree with her. I 18 think five or six days of sick leave a year is enough, 'cause 19 they've got vacation and they've got holiday -- you know, we 20 bank the holidays just 'cause they don't have a choice. But 21 they do have vacation and that they can take if they have to. 22 Okay. The County -- you know, the County does enough for the 23 rest of it. But where I disagreed with her is what she 24 said -- where it got tedious in the meeting was, don't take 25 away what employees already have accumulated, and don't limit 11-05-08 wk 72 1 what they can accumulate. 'Cause that's where some 2 suggestions came in. And I had employees say, "Look, I've 3 accumulated this much." Or, "I like to accumulate mine, 4 because if something major happens to me, you know, five 5 years from now, I have a heart attack, have to take off six 6 months, I want my sick leave. I don't want that temporary 7 help." 8 MS. HYDE: And this was before Jeannie had her feet 9 on the ground. And what I was trying to get them to 10 understand is that GASB makes us put all these liabilities 11 out there as expenditures. True or false? And so, these are 12 out there against us as liabilities. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Rusty, I think another thing that 14 may come into play is, if we consider capping the accrual of 15 these, that may be part and parcel of a program whereby we 16 put short-term disability -- 17 MS. HYDE: That's what I tried to -- 18 JUDGE TINLEY: -- in place, County-funded for the 19 employees. 20 MS. HYDE: Right. 21 JUDGE TINLEY: And that may be a legal issue coming 22 down the road. I think if we provide that for them on an 23 ongoing basis, I think we can probably do that, because we're 24 effectively covering that issue for them. But, here again, I 25 don't know. 11-05-08 wk 73 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. The biggest issue I 2 had, 'cause I have some long -- some employees that have been 3 there a long time and have accrued a lot of sick leave, and 4 their biggest deal -- and some of them have family members 5 that came down with cancer or whatever, okay? And if you 6 look at sick leave, it can be used for the employee or 7 immediate, you know, family. Say it's a spouse that got 8 cancer and, you know, is bedridden for six months, and that 9 employee's got that accumulation. He likes that. He doesn't 10 want that short-term/long-term, 'cause it's not going to 11 cover his salary while he's out with his spouse, or whether 12 he's out with himself -- you know, himself or herself. So, 13 he doesn't want to lose what he's accumulated. Because a 14 good employee, that's what they really want to do, is 15 accumulate their sick leave in case something major happens, 16 so that they can have it. The short-term disability doesn't 17 take the place of that. 18 JUDGE TINLEY: Not particularly in that particular 19 instance. I understand what you're saying. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's why they would rather 21 have the accumulation. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Okay. Jeannie, you got 23 something to add in the mix? 24 MS. ROMAN: How long does a person have to be out 25 before short-term kicks in? 11-05-08 wk 74 1 JUDGE TINLEY: We don't have that in place yet. 2 MS. HYDE: It depends on what we decide. 3 MS. ROMAN: Okay. 4 MS. HYDE: It can be one day, it can be one minute, 5 it can be six weeks, it can be 12 weeks. 6 MS. ROMAN: Okay. 7 MS. HYDE: It's whatever contract that we sign. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: And some of them are retroactive; 9 you lose the first five days, and there are all sorts of 10 different contracts. It's by contract. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, I think Tim had his 12 hand up. 13 MS. HARGIS: As far as the sick leave is concerned, 14 Tim and I are in agreement on this one. I do think that we 15 need to cap it at -- at two years or something. I mean, and 16 I know I'm not supposed to mention the place down the street, 17 but they went through this same thing. You need to come to a 18 point where you grandfather in "X" and then the rest of them 19 are gone. 20 MS. HYDE: That's right. 21 MS. HARGIS: Because, you know, the possibility of 22 a person using more than two years, Rusty, or a year's worth 23 of days -- I mean, and I think what they came up with was 24 1,200 hours. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But they do pay for it. 11-05-08 wk 75 1 MS. HARGIS: No, they didn't pay for it. They 2 called it a -- 1,200, couldn't accumulate any more than that. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I think if the person leaves, 4 they have to pay them for some of it, where the County 5 doesn't. 6 MS. HARGIS: No. 7 MS. HYDE: No, they do not pay them for it. 8 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I agree they're not saying 9 they didn't, but I thought that was part of their agreement. 10 MS. HARGIS: No, they just grandfathered it in, and 11 so they got the 1,200 hours, because I think that's a -- you 12 know, a reasonable amount of hours that a person would use a 13 year or two years, and then we -- we grandfather that amount, 14 and then you lose the rest. I think that's reasonable. And 15 get it down to where -- GASB only requires us to book one 16 year, so we'd only be one year at a time. 17 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: So we don't have to show it 18 on our books. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay. Well, it's -- it's an 20 accounting problem. Tim? 21 MR. BOLLIER: I was on the same track as Jeannie 22 was on. But, see, 'cause I have an employee that's got well 23 over 20 years, and she has a lot -- like, 1,200 hours of sick 24 time. So, I -- I was going to say, you know, that to me, 25 that's a good employee, to accumulate that much sick time, so 11-05-08 wk 76 1 why -- I mean, why take it away from her? You know, or why 2 put a cap on it? Because that's somebody that's coming to 3 work each and every single day, and so why should she -- why 4 should -- why should she be -- 5 JUDGE TINLEY: Your point is, you're penalizing the 6 people that aren't abusing the system. 7 MR. BOLLIER: You're penalizing them. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: I -- it's a good point. It's a good 9 point. 10 MR. BOLLIER: I don't want to. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: But for accounting purposes, we've 12 got to have some degree of definity so that we can book it 13 and move on down the road. 14 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right. 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. I've got a question. 16 Did you have something else? 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No. 18 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sick time is really a 19 benefit. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Mm-hmm. 21 MS. HARGIS: It is. 22 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: It truly is. So, in this 23 language here, you're going to change the 240 hours to the -- 24 to 120? 25 MS. HYDE: Whatever you guys tell me to. 11-05-08 wk 77 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Wait a minute. You're 2 suggesting that we change from 12 to 6? 3 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir, I am. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So, you want to say 120 5 hours of sick leave? 6 MS. HYDE: We're not going to pay for any of that. 7 We don't have it in the budget. If you go to the one that 8 you're looking at, we would accrue in excess of 240, pay for 9 hours accrued the date checks are written. We're not able to 10 do that, because we don't have money in the budget to do 11 that. So that's why I said, just change this whole thing to 12 go from 12 days to 6 days. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. Where is that 12 and 14 6? 15 MS. HYDE: Page 4 -- I mean, Page 21. 4.04 goes 16 from 12 days earned to 6 days earned, and they would earn 17 3.33 hours -- let's see -- so that means they earn 4 hours a 18 month. 19 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I apologize, I still don't 20 see it. 21 MS. HYDE: It's not in here. It needs to be. It's 22 changed. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That may be a good reason 24 why. 25 MS. HYDE: This is a good change. 11-05-08 wk 78 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Very good reason. 3 MS. HYDE: But if I'm understanding correctly from 4 the discussion, then we want to grandfather current employees 5 at their levels that they're at. 6 MS. HARGIS: Not necessarily. Their levels at two 7 years, so whatever two years, the hours would be. 8 MS. HYDE: There was one that said that, and then 9 there was a whole lot that said grandfather, so I'm trying to 10 get a feel for what we're looking at. 11 JUDGE TINLEY: We got to cap it at some point. We 12 can't just say grandfather it. 13 MS. HARGIS: No, you can't grandfather them all. 14 MS. HYDE: But you've got those employees that have 15 earned those, so you're going to have to pay them. That's 16 not right. If we're going to try to take it away, you know, 17 I'm going to have to stand up for the employees on this -- 18 this one. 19 MR. EMERSON: You don't have to pay it. It's not a 20 vested benefit. 21 MS. HYDE: You don't have to, but what is right is 22 right. If they've earned it and they've got it and they've 23 got it banked, then we need to at least look at doing a 24 grandfather and let attrition knock it out and start fresh. 25 Don't penalize an employee that's got 600 or 800 hours that 11-05-08 wk 79 1 has used -- has not used it, has accrued it. Especially if 2 we don't have long-term or short-term disability that they 3 get. 4 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They ought to be glad they 5 haven't been sick and haven't had to use it. 6 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Absolutely. 7 MS. HYDE: What about those that have? And, I 8 mean, we had one last year. 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: If they're sick, then they 10 needed it. 11 MS. HYDE: That's right. We had one last year that 12 was out, and his wife was out. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: I don't know how you 14 differentiate between the two, but it's -- I mean, there is 15 no way that we can allow this stuff to accumulate forever. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: One suggestion would be to 17 grandfather it as of January 1 as to whatever they've got 18 banked. 19 MS. HYDE: Right. 20 JUDGE TINLEY: Not to exceed. 21 MS. HARGIS: And not accumulating -- 22 MS. HYDE: They don't accumulate. 23 MS. HARGIS: -- until they go down to a certain 24 level. And, you know, if you have 1,200 hours, you can't 25 accumulate any more hours until you get down to 600. 11-05-08 wk 80 1 Because, I mean, 1,200 hours is a lot of hours. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I think that's really the 3 approach. You analyze everybody's cutoff the end of the 4 year, and you have an accrual ceiling, and they roll over 5 till next year, and you're just not accruing any more, so 6 you're not really disenfranchising anybody. They still 7 continue to have 1,200 hours. To use Tim's example, she's 8 going to roll them over. We roll them over, but she's not 9 going to add another 40 onto that. Just max them out. What 10 people fail to understand sometimes is the point you were 11 trying to make, Bruce, that sick leave time is to be used 12 when you are sick and have a real need for it, not to 13 supplement your vacation or supplement the end of year -- 14 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: And not to supplement your 15 pay. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: It's for sickness. 17 MS. HYDE: Right. 18 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Exactly. 19 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's what I was trying -- 20 you're trying to say. 21 MS. HYDE: Right. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'd do it that way, freeze it. 23 I'm sure I've got some employees with well over 1,200 hours. 24 MS. HYDE: You do. You've got six or seven. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You may. 11-05-08 wk 81 1 MS. HYDE: Some of them have 1,400, 1,600 hours. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Easy. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Well, with that concept in mind, 4 work on it. 5 MS. HYDE: Okay. 6 JUDGE TINLEY: Okay, next major. 7 MS. HYDE: We put in all the information about 8 health insurance, when open enrollment is, when you can add 9 dependents, when you can't, trying to give them more 10 information. Also, regarding their insurance, what -- when 11 does their insurance stop if they separate from the county? 12 We have a lot of people that misunderstand. Also, there's 13 information in here about T.C.D.R.S. and our retirement. 14 People do not understand our retirement plan. They do not 15 understand that retirement with T.C.D.R.S. is not health 16 insurance benefits. 17 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's why we pay you the 18 big bucks. 19 MS. HYDE: It also discusses fraud, because people 20 need to understand that -- that when they do things with the 21 insurance that is not true, that is fraud, and it's fraud 22 against this county. Then -- and then I go get those two. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Going against the 24 government if you take benefits from them, too. 25 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 11-05-08 wk 82 1 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Particularly after you've 2 died. 3 MS. HYDE: Holidays. 4 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: You're going to let that 5 one go right over your head? 6 MS. HYDE: I'm just going to hopefully let that one 7 go, but I don't see how I can. If you look at Page 30, 8 that's grayed out, because I still need clarification on what 9 the GASB liability issues are. 10 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay, good. 11 MS. HYDE: I thought that we had agreed, but the 12 Judge said that we didn't vote on it, I think, is that 13 holidays would be paid out this year if you worked. Or not. 14 They would be paid out this year. But I don't think we ever 15 asked for a vote on that. We talked about it, but that 16 wasn't ever voted on, where we had people that use holidays 17 as comp time, and so if they work the holiday, they get paid 18 for the hours that they worked, but they're not getting paid 19 for the holiday. The holiday is then banked, so you get an 20 additional day of time off, and it just continues to add, and 21 it adds to our liability as well. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If we -- the best solution to 23 that, along -- and this takes care of a lot of the overtime, 24 is if we can pay them directly for their holiday. 25 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Do what? 11-05-08 wk 83 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Pay them for the holiday. 2 Instead of banking it, pay them those hours. 3 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: I can tell you that the 4 gray part on the top, that is the law. You can do these 5 three types. You can grant the same number of hours off in a 6 specified work -- alternate work day. You can pay them at 7 the regular straight time rate for the holidays worked, and 8 credited with an equal number of compensatory hours, or if 9 authorized by y'all, you can say that they get twice the 10 regular straight time rate. What a deal. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Buster, the way that works, if 12 you have an officer that's working Christmas day, that's a 13 holiday. He's getting paid to work that day, okay? Somebody 14 that's off that day is still getting paid, so he needs to be 15 paid, you know, for working that day and paid for the 16 holiday, or he banks the holiday as comp time. What we've 17 been having to do is bank that holiday as comp time, straight 18 comp time, all right? So that he doesn't lose it. It would 19 solve a whole lot of problems if he got paid instead of 20 banking it. If he's off that day, it doesn't have any 21 effect. It only affects the ones that are working. 22 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: That's right. 23 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: And just pay them straight 24 time, or -- 25 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 11-05-08 wk 84 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: -- or time and a half? 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Straight time, it says you pay 3 them. You're doubling that day's pay, because he's getting 4 paid for working and he's getting paid for -- 5 MS. HYDE: Already getting paid time and a half. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If this was paid that way, it 7 solves a lot. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Actually, I like that, 9 personally. I like that. I wish we could go that route. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: You can pay double time for 11 holidays. 12 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That's what you're -- 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Pretty common. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right, let me word it 15 this way. I wish that we would do that. 16 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Okay. If I start doing it -- 17 and I would love to start doing that, 'cause it will go a 18 long ways with getting comp -- getting vacation down, because 19 then the only time, if that person wants more time off than 20 his regular days off, he's burning vacation. 21 MS. HYDE: That's right. 22 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: That's the second solution to 23 his problem. We're getting there. 24 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Well, I agree. And even -- 25 MS. HYDE: Here the problem -- here's the problem. 11-05-08 wk 85 1 Here the problem is. It's not budgeted. 2 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Where we may get into it, 3 because I have, you know, 100 employees, okay? And, true, 4 not all of them are working on every holiday. So, it can 5 come real close. If I'm taking that pay out of my overtime 6 budget, towards the end of the year we may run out of 7 overtime budget. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: There'll be enough left in -- 9 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The jailer budget. 10 JUDGE TINLEY: -- the jailer salary budget. 11 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Gentlemen, I want you to know 12 I do not have a single jailer opening, and don't expect one. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Hopefully. This is a new 14 budget year. By the end of the year, we'll have money left 15 in that line item. 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: He's trying to warn us 17 there won't be a surplus in that account. 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I'm trying to tell you, 19 because of the changes y'all did this last year in salaries 20 and things like that, I expect my turnover rate to drop to 21 just about zilch. Now, I have two deputy openings, that 22 that's where every law enforcement agency is now having a 23 hard time. People don't want to do it any more. 24 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Quickly, do you give them 25 the option of taking the cash or the time off? 11-05-08 wk 86 1 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: No. 2 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: They -- 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Pay them. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You take this damn money, by 5 god. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I think we just -- we don't 7 have to. We can just pay them. 8 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: All right. I mean, I 9 understand that. 10 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: That would solve a lot. 11 MS. HYDE: So we're going to pay them straight time 12 for the holiday. 13 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: Starting January 1? 14 MS. HYDE: Starting -- 15 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You got my vote to do it. 16 MS. HYDE: Or right now? Or when we do this? 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I don't know if you can 18 effectively change a policy right now. We have to do it at 19 the next Commissioners Court, or January 1. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Yeah, this is just a 21 workshop. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: Yeah. We're -- 23 MS. HYDE: I'm not talking about, like, today. 24 JUDGE TINLEY: -- putting a policy in place, but I 25 think it makes sense that, you know, they're -- if they work 11-05-08 wk 87 1 holidays, they get paid. 2 MS. HYDE: That's right. 3 JUDGE TINLEY: Get paid double time, effectively. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: May want to check and see 5 what federal law enforcement people do. It's unbelievable. 6 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: You want to know what federal 7 and state do? 8 MS. HYDE: No. No. 9 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: They send them home, period. 10 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I know. 11 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Sometimes -- 12 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Send the helicopters. 13 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: The duct tape. 14 JUDGE TINLEY: Extra wide, extra strong. 15 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: Double, two-ply. 16 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sorry. 17 MS. HYDE: Most of the next is all regarding leaves 18 and military leaves and supplemental military pay. If you go 19 to Page 34, that 4.25, that would be one that you guys -- 20 currently we don't do. Currently. 21 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Let's see. What, now? 22 MS. HYDE: Page 34, and its 4.25. 23 JUDGE TINLEY: Where you pay the difference? 24 MS. HYDE: Yes, sir. 25 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Is there any chance of you 11-05-08 wk 88 1 going off and serving in Iraq? 2 JUDGE TINLEY: After the women and children. 3 (Laughter.) 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: So -- 5 JUDGE TINLEY: I'm on the retired rolls. No, I 6 think -- I think that's a -- there are two ways you can 7 approach that. Someone that -- that's involuntarily called 8 to active duty, which there's a fair amount of that going on. 9 I don't know that we've had any. There's a difference 10 between involuntary, called to active duty, and -- and 11 volunteering for an assignment. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Right. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: If there's an involuntary call, the 14 -- some outfits just keep paying them their regular wage. 15 There's some that do that. And some pay them the 16 differential. Whatever they lose by virtue of what they earn 17 while they're on active duty and what they would otherwise 18 make, they pay them the difference, so that there's a 19 constant income. 20 COMMISSIONER OEHLER: They want to pay their bills 21 so their family can live while they're gone. 22 JUDGE TINLEY: That's right. 23 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Judge, isn't this -- didn't 24 we agree to do something like this when we signed on with 25 that -- 11-05-08 wk 89 1 JUDGE TINLEY: ESGR. 2 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: -- ESGR? 3 JUDGE TINLEY: No, you don't -- you don't 4 automatically agree to do that as policy. But, certainly, if 5 you do do that, and notify those folks, they'll give you 6 another gold star, I assure you. 7 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Okay. 8 JUDGE TINLEY: They encourage that. 9 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Yeah, okay. 10 MS. HYDE: When we talked about this one, I went 11 ahead and talked to the Air Force and the Army, just to get a 12 sanity check, and that's why E is on there. The big kicker 13 there is that the person has not committed a voluntary act 14 that has the effect of adding to the period that the person 15 is subject to active military duty, 'cause we've had some 16 things that have gone off -- 17 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I have -- I've got one. 18 MS. HYDE: -- and they just keep adding and adding 19 and adding. So, we needed a -- a way to get out. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But there is the one I have, 21 and this person's been on active duty now since 2002, when I 22 lost him, and he's been on active duty the whole time. Now, 23 the problem we have with him is, we're not paying him 24 anything. He's still accumulating time and all the rest of 25 that. But it's one of those congressional orders where I 11-05-08 wk 90 1 have no say-so, and there is no limit to the -- to how long 2 they keep him, period. 3 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: You hold that slot open. 4 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: We hold the slot. We -- we 5 change the salary, okay, so that I can -- or we did it where 6 I can fill that slot. I filled the slot. If he comes back, 7 then I can't -- if I get an opening, I can't hire one to fill 8 that one, is the way the Court took care of that. But, I 9 mean, if you start paying them supplemental pay, paying for 10 six years of supplemental pay when we -- 11 MS. HYDE: That's not what it says, Rusty. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: No, this would be prospective, and 13 it's an involuntary -- completely involuntary. 14 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: If it's a congressional order 15 that he's there, I'm not sure it's not involuntary. 16 MS. HYDE: But he committed a voluntary act that 17 added to his -- 18 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: How? 19 MS. HYDE: Yes, 'cause he signed his own orders. 20 MS. ROMAN: If it's who I'm thinking it is, it was 21 a voluntary. 22 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: But how do you -- I tried to 23 prove it was voluntary so I wouldn't have to worry about it, 24 but then I got the order back to where it said it was a 25 congressional order and I have no choice, and that's what 11-05-08 wk 91 1 they sent me. 2 MS. HYDE: Funeral leave was wide-open on Page 35. 3 It was wide-open. It was up to whoever was in charge. They 4 could be off for three days, they could be off for six days, 5 they could be off for 20 days. And what we agreed to is 6 three days off. If they're going out of state, then they 7 could have four days off. If it's -- if it's where someone 8 like my daddy dies and I go bonkers, then I need to go out on 9 FMLA just like anybody else and be off for 30 days or 10 something. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Okay. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Works. 13 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Sounds good. 14 MS. HYDE: There was nothing on jury duty, witness 15 duty, private litigation, so that's in there. Emergency 16 situations. After our ice storm, where there was a lot of 17 inclement weather discussions, they put together some good 18 stuff. So -- I mean, and the rest of that is just to read; 19 it's all brand-new. 20 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: The only suggestion I have is 21 that you actually define what "immediate family" is on your 22 funeral leave. 'Cause I had some trying to argue that, well, 23 my Uncle Ed was..." 24 MS. HYDE: Mother, father, sister, brother. 25 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: I agree. But, you know -- 11-05-08 wk 92 1 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Or your spouse's mother, 2 father, sister, brother. 3 SHERIFF HIERHOLZER: And grandparents. 4 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: I read that in here. 5 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Mm-hmm. Needs to be both 6 sides. 7 MS. HYDE: I don't have one, so I just -- mother, 8 father, sister, brother. That's all I got. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: Those are the highlights you got to 10 present to us? 11 MS. HYDE: Those are the highlights. 12 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: Looks good. 13 JUDGE TINLEY: Appreciate the participation and 14 discussion from everybody. It's good input. May have seemed 15 a little silly from time to time, but we got some issues out 16 on the table that needed to be out there, and I think it gave 17 some direction of how we may want to go. Continue to 18 communicate with Ms. Hyde on your thoughts or ideas. And 19 anything else, gentlemen? 20 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Judge, I just want to make a 21 comment, that Commissioners Court is known for a lot of 22 things. You're county fathers; you're the budget officers 23 and all of those things. But, in my opinion, the single most 24 important job that we have is policy-making. We're the 25 policy-making body of the county. And, you know, when you 11-05-08 wk 93 1 get off -- you get off with these old-timers that serve on 2 Commissioners Court, that's the conversation, and that's the 3 language that they use. You know, they -- that's -- they 4 talk in those terms, as opposed to how many miles of roads 5 they're going to build this year, that kind of thing, or how 6 -- 19 different ways to break a rock. And you -- we're the 7 policy-making body, and we take that very seriously. That's 8 our gig right there. That's all I wanted to say. 9 JUDGE TINLEY: I think, by law, that's our 10 function. We're legislative branch, quote-unquote. 11 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: Exactly. 12 JUDGE TINLEY: And that's nothing more than local 13 policy. 14 COMMISSIONER BALDWIN: That's exactly right. 15 JUDGE TINLEY: You have anything, Bill? 16 COMMISSIONER WILLIAMS: No, sir. 17 JUDGE TINLEY: Bruce? 18 MR. OEHLER: Nothing. 19 JUDGE TINLEY: Let's be adjourned. 20 (Commissioners workshop was adjourned at 4:21 p.m.) 21 - - - - - - - - - - 22 23 24 25 11-05-08 wk 94 1 STATE OF TEXAS | 2 COUNTY OF KERR | 3 The above and foregoing is a true and complete 4 transcription of my stenotype notes taken in my capacity as 5 County Clerk of the Commissioners Court of Kerr County, 6 Texas, at the time and place heretofore set forth. 7 DATED at Kerrville, Texas, this 18th day of November, 8 2008. 9 10 JANNETT PIEPER, Kerr County Clerk 11 BY: _________________________________ Kathy Banik, Deputy County Clerk 12 Certified Shorthand Reporter 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 11-05-08 wk