Travis County Commissioners Court
October 11, 2005
Item 9
9. Consider and take appropriate action on the following: a. Routine personnel amendments; b. Non-routine personnel actions - sheriff - salary adjustments - Travis County code, section 10.03002; and c. Non-routine personnel actions - sheriff - salary adjustment exceptions - Travis County code, section 10.03013. Can we discuss all of 9 without 10 or do I need to call 10 up, also?
>> you can discuss 9 without 10.
>> okay. Move approval of a the routine matters.
>> second.
>> discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. And on 9 b, I could see them there, I guess I wanted just a brief discussion, to make sure that I understood exactly what we were doing. We have sort of been talking about doing something like this for months, I guess.
>> yes.
>> here we are just doing it.
>> what we are doing, judge, members of the court, you will remember that during the budget process the -- the court approved some special funding for the sheriff's office to accommodate their challenge associated with recruitment and retention of nurses and other medical personnel. What we have done here as you are well aware, you directed h.r. To continue market salary study on the nursing job family. That study is now in progress, we expect to come in to you know later than mid-november with the results. In order to expedite and address the need of the department, the non-routine items here are brought before you because -- because the department has applied funds to address their recruitment and retention issue. What we have here is the application of those items are really exceeding the current policy. Because it exceeds the current policy that's in place, we are bringing it fort as a non-routine item for your approval supported by hr. Do you know when these positions will be filled. I know that we are making the adjustments, I understand the severity and the critical point of need, but is there any time line as far as when these positions will be filled according to what -- what we are doing here up front to -- to satisfy those ends?
>> my name is [indiscernible] with planning and budget. I can make this comment. That is we had 11 vacant nursing positions in the sheriff's office about three weeks ago and when I looked last Friday, there were five.
>> so six.
>> that is pretty remarkable. Because those positions have been vacant for more than a year.
>> how long?
>> more than a year, almost a year.
>> with these adjustments, there had been some significant activity of what --
>> I can only speak to -- to the fact that we've had a significant change. [laughter]
>> do you think some of the -- retires were the temporary folks and they knew the job and --
>> the department may wish to speak to that, when we met with them a couple of weeks ago. It's my understanding that the salary adjustment because it was competitive, attracted those who had been with the county back into the county from the contracts.
>> yes. Good morning, judge, Commissioners. [indiscernible] with the sheriff's office. Some of those that -- that are coming back and that we're in the process of recruiting right now are the contract employees that had been with us, went to the contract agencies. And so now because of the salary adjustments they are interested in coming back.
>> how many vacancies do you have today?
>> five.
>> yeah, there's five. There's -- we thought there were going to be six, but we actually have five and we are working with the other one to retain her and then we have -- we have at least four more, we are working on right now recruiting. That we have pretty good hopes of getting hopefully all four of them in.
>> so does the five cover registered nurses, lvn's --
>> yes, it's both. I think there's two lvn's.
>> two?
>> uh-huh.
>> okay.
>> judge, I move approval of the non-routine personnel items.
>> discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. Now, is that -- is that b and c?
>> yes.
>> that covers b and c of 9?
>> yes, it does.
>> okay.
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Last Modified:
Wednesday, October 11, 2005 4:42 PM