Travis County Commissioners Court
September 16, 2008
Item 10
Let's take one more item before we take up the health care district, and that item is a long item which is why I didn't put out consent but I think it's straightforward, something we have already agreed to do. And based upon real good legal advice we have a whole lot of subitems here on item number 10. Consider and take appropriate action on the following compensation items regarding the transition of starflight employees to county employees. A, authorize human resources re new hires. Move approval.
>> second.
>> this just gets it done.
>> yes, sir.
>> discussion? Anything we don't knee that we need to? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. 10 b, authorize hrmd to waive the 30-day waiting period for starflight transfer personnel to be eligible for health, dental, life, disability and flex believe spending account benefits effective October 1, 2008. We need to do this in order to -- for that to be the working effective date for us. Move approval.
>> second.
>> anything we need to hear?
>> no, sir.
>> all in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. C, authorize starflight transfer person nell to receive 2009 cost of living adjustment when implemented for other classified employees. This is let's treat our new employees as well as we treated our old ones.
>> move approval.
>> second.
>> any --
>> no.
>> [inaudible].
>> you are not this quiet normally. Let's slow down.
>> it looks like you are on a roll.
>> all in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. All of these pertain to the same 13 employees, right?
>> that is correct.
>> d is authorize county auditor to pay starflight transfer personnel and current county personnel longevity on their anniversary of employment with city of Austin with an adjustment to determine amount due based on last receipt of stability pay from city of Austin in December 2007. So what we're trying to do is make sure there's no adverse impact on these 13 employees of transferring from city employee status to county employees.
>> that is correct. And I do want to make one note with the cola and that is both the cola and longevity also apply to current county employees, which are the pilots and mechanics. Edmund's staff. We've also in the interlocal that we've had, we've also complied with what the city of Austin did in regards to cola, in regards to longevity or stability pay is what they call it. In which they get in December. What we're doing with these two items is simply adjusting them to the county policy, which means that instead of getting a stability or longevity in December, they will now get it on their anniversary date. All we're doing is moving them over and making sure their transitioning to the county policy. Same thing with the cola.
>> that's why I move approval.
>> second.
>> all in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. E is to apply Travis County policies, chapter 10, sections 10.03, 10.044, 10.0451, 10.0452, 10.0453 and 10.0454 related to vacation, sick, fmla, family medical leave, holidays, personal holidays, et cetera, to starflight transfer personnel. Move approval.
>> second. If,.
>> mr. Hobby? I was just going to say there that we were fortunate because you all have already done this before with transferring city employees to the county so this is just applying those current policies.
>> and it worked well last time.
>> yes, sir. I assume. I assume so.
>> [laughter]
>> you have to consider charles vaughn who works in payroll because as he's worked us through this, it's not as simple as he will tell you, and it has not been a snap of the fingers and all this happens. When we transfer employees, this gentleman as well as other folks in hr, will have to make adjustments based on getting these people transitioned and there's certain limitations with some of this to where it goes away in two careers. Charles will tell you payroll is sometimes an adjustment has to be made.
>> just to remind the court, the same policies that we're addressing in e are the same ones as we transferred the onsite sewage program years ago so these are not new policies to accommodate this particular action, kerr existing policies based on that. My good friend charles may have some comments to make relative to implementation and administration of this.
>> charles bond, Travis County auditor's officer payroll section.
>> is that you this morning?
>> we worked out all the details and that's not really the issue. My only point is any time you have a policy that applies to a small group of people, it is pretty much by definition a bad policy because it takes a whole lot of manual input just to make sure that these people are treated per the policy. It takes a substantial amount of institutional memory to remember, okay, well, this happened, oh, I've got file over here that explains it. It just becomes much more difficult to implement something that is not applied to the way every other employee receives that same benefit. When you have a small individualized service, it makes service delivery much more difficult, let me put it that way, and much more expensive. Like going to neiman's or wal-mart, you are paying for a lot when you have individualized services. This is 25 people all together. 13 are coming over.
>> 32 total.
>> we'll have a set of policies for 13 people. To make it go smoothly, I can't always guarantee it goes smoothly. We've done it before so it's not impossible, but just from our perspective --
>> taking city employees and trying to make county employees out of them.
>> yeah, I think the one thing that I hope will happen for charles as well as everybody else that -- again, there's a number of people that -- we met with a whole group of folks so I'm missing a lot of people here, but I think that what we're going to find is we're transitioning all of this to county and that's the best thing from an administrative point of view, human resource, finance point of view. I'll stop there.
>> that's why I move approval.
>> second.
>> discussion?
>> that just means willie, and casey, had you all are caught at neiman's shopping, you all are in trouble.
>> all in favor? That passes by unanimous vote. And the final item, order amending -- f, order amending chapter 10 of the Travis County code to add section 10.04515, paid transferred vacation leave.
>> what we have is under the current policy you went with what the city had when you did the transfer of those employees back when. And that is the city allowed up to 240 hours of which they would pay you and then that was hit. So when we transferred city of Austin employees the last time, they didn't really bring any vacation with them at all because they had nothing in excess of that because they were paid the 240 so they came over with zero. What we now have is the city has changed their policy on when they did that, charles, was it two or three years ago, but now they allow employees to accrue up to 400. What barbara had to do was she had to write an order that allowed that adjustment of time from the 240 to the 400. And so that's what you see although she wrote up two options for you to consider. One option is the one that I would like for you to consider from a management point of view and that is where the employees would come over with that excess ray indication and they would be able to utilize it once they've utilized the accrual of the county vacation, personal holidays, et cetera, the county benefits. So they would just county benefits first, and then if they had this excess vacation, and if you look at the totals, which I can provide you, you will see they are not large, there's only a couple of folks that are even going to be bring over, in fact only one brings the maximum. That allows them to use their accrual that they brought over. Now, what would happen, though, is they must use that accrual within a two-year period. So they have two years and then it goes away. And so that's my recommendation that we go with that and that allows them to basically continue their benefits and be able to use their excess. If they quit --
>> which option is that?
>> that's the first one which says management recommendation.
>> that's option number 1.
>> what is hrmd's response?
>> we would support management's recommendation.
>> the employees have been told I would be recommending that to the court. Now, there is a -- there's a caveat, and that is if they decide to resign or leave they are not going to get paid for the excess. It's only if they stay and use their benefits.
>> within that two career time frame.
>> that's correct. Right, that's correct.
>> and they lose it after the two-year period if it's not used.
>> motion and second to approve option 1. Discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote.
>> thank you very much.
>> please welcome our new employees.
>> thank you. Appreciate it very much.
>> we will take up the health care district and then go after this one to the county budget.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, September 16, 2008 2:37 AM