DAUPHIN COUNTY BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS
Salary Board Meeting
Wednesday, August 2, 2006 (10:00am)

MEMBERS PRESENT

Jeff Haste, Chairman
Dominic D. DiFrancesco, II, Vice Chairman
George P. Hartwick, III, Secretary

STAFF PRESENT

Kay Sinner, Bob Hawley

MINUTES

Ms. Sinner: Good morning Commissioners. We have two Salary Board items. We have an elimination of a Dietary Aide position at Spring Creek to create a Cook position. We also have the creation of a full-time Legal Clerk I in MDJ Semic's office.

Mr. Haste: Marie did you get these?

Ms. Rebuck: Yes I did.

Mr. Haste: Why do we still have confusion with the District Judge position? I saw that whole flurry of emails back and forth. I thought at the beginning of the year the whole idea was to have you and Mike get on the same page and have the same numbers and now Mike has a position budgeted that you don't have and I thought we ended that.

Ms. Sinner: Correct. I had thought that position had been utilized, actually created, and I researched my paperwork and the position I had thought had been created was a Legal Clerk II, which was budgeted for 2005. I don't know why this position wasn't created. Last year we were aware of it and it wasn't created at that time. It is from 2004 that it was budgeted for.

Mr. Haste: If we are going to keep control of the positions your log has to be rock solid accurate.

Ms. Sinner: Right. I don't know why we didn't create it. I thought we were utilizing that position. I can't see where we did. Maybe I thought it was going to be created sooner than it was. I know there was talk.

Mr. Haste: At budget time when Mike had it in the budget, don't the two of you sit down?

Ms. Sinner: We do now, but that was from 2004. Like I said I was aware of it last year but I thought we had.

Mr. Haste: When we do the budget every year we go over it and we put positions in there.

Ms. Sinner: It wasn't until this past January that we started actually creating them.

Mr. Haste: But come January the two of you should have had the same number.

Ms. Sinner: I can't explain why we didn't. We thought we compared notes.

Mr. Haste: Okay. Now I'll go back to this, is this a position above and beyond the original agreed to number? Every time I ask this I get the same spongy feel good answer.

Ms. Sinner: The total clerks are 85.5. Even last year when we had a chart it was 85.5. Bob goes by the positions that Mike gives him. He has been looking at 85.5 even though it hadn't been created. He actually was going to have this created in Pianka's office.

Mr. Haste: Was this supposed to be a floater? I thought the last position was the idea of creating a position that was going to be assigned to Pianka but was going to be a floater.

Mr. Hartwick: From what I understand is that this position, and Bob I don't want to answer for you, but this person is also going to be used at the Prison?

Mr. Hawley: That is right Commissioner. As you know we have one full-time employee. When she is on vacation or sick we have to have someone there to process paperwork for the Judges. So this position is very important. Through my experience and Judge Lewis' experience last year was that we basically end up asking and begging most of the time for an MDJ office to dispatch someone in those emergency situations to conduct that work. In order to preclude that we would like to designate an individual in the MDJ offices whose primary responsibility is in that Judge's office. Also then they would have an official responsibility to assist when that person is on vacation to fill in that subject work and conduct the necessary tasks.

Mr. Haste: Why doesn't that say that on the sheet?

Mr. Hawley: We had originally planned to do this in Judge Pianka's office. We have a trainer and a good manager that exist there and an extra room that existed and also because of the caseload. Make a long story short, the MDJ resisted that and Judge Lewis said it would be fine to move it then and that is why we are putting this position in Judge Semic's office. His caseload will allow them to have this person servicing them.

Mr. Haste: Does that say that somewhere in the job description because it doesn't say that anywhere on the justification form?

Mr. Hawley: It does not specifically say that. We had to do the paperwork at some point in time and we had moved this position from Judge Solomon's. Actually where it started from is Judge Stewart's, it was moved to Judge Solomon's and from Judge Solomon's to Judge Pianka, but it never was physically moved from Solomon's to Pianka's. My spreadsheet shows those two vacancies in Judge Solomon's office.

Mr. Haste: Can I ask this, after we are done can we make sure.first of all, Mike, is this in the budget?

Mr. Yohe: Yes.

Mr. Haste: Can we now again try to make sure that what numbers Bob has, the numbers Kay has and the numbers Mike has finally match?

Mr. Hawley: I think they will after this.

Mr. Haste: Well, I heard that once before and I saw the big flow chart.

Mr. Hartwick: You make mention that this is being created in MDJ Semic's office and eliminated from another office. Where is the associated elimination from Solomon's?

Ms. Sinner: It doesn't exist. It has never been approved via Salary Board so that is why I don't have it.

Mr. Haste: It exists only in the budget, not in Personnel's records.

Ms. Sinner: Right.

Mr. Haste: It doesn't exist currently on Kay's Salary Board, but it is in Mike's budget, from what I am hearing.

Mr. Hartwick: I understand what you are saying.

Mr. Saylor: Bob, can I ask on these charts that you have been supplying to me, which have remained somewhat consistent, when we are done here we are going to have this additional position in Semic's office but you are saying this position on your chart for Judge Pianka is going to be gone.

Mr. Hawley: That one will go away.

Mr. Hartwick: So it's on Pianka in that one and Solomon on this one.

Mr. Saylor: Apparently.

Mr. Hartwick: One other question can we be assured that you will not ask to create any additional positions in any of the MDJ offices after today? I want that to be part of the public record as it relates to this year's current budget.

Mr. Hawley: The answer to your question is yes, provided that we agree today that there is one vacancy that continues to exist in Judge Solomon's that is not currently filled, one in Judge Stewart's and one in Judge Judy's.

Mr. Haste: I don't care where they are, after today you are saying there are still 3 vacancies. Because where you slide them doesn't really matter to me.

Mr. Hartwick: I asked about creating a position. I didn't say filling a position. We will not be creating any additional positions in the MDJ offices after today.

Ms. Sinner: Without eliminating a position. We might reclassify a I to a II. This does not.

Mr. Haste: I think he wants to know if the total compliment will stay the same.

Mr. Hawley: Yes, the total compliment of 85.5 remains the same. It has remained the same for the past 1.5 years.

Mr. Hartwick: A simple yes or no would be helpful.

Mr. Saylor: It might be good if the DJ's come up with more ideas about reclassifying or moving one to another to wait until next year at this point so we don't have to go through this heartache again. We have a budget coming up in a couple months. If they have changes make sure they list it in the budget and we can implement it next year.

Mr. Haste: Is there a motion to approve the Salary Board items? I should note that if the President Judge were here, he would have a vote on item B, since he is not, we will take A and B together.

It was moved by Mr. DiFrancesco and seconded by Ms. Rebuck to approve Items A & B on the Salary Board request. All were in favor. Motion carries.

1. Spring Creek
   1. Eliminate a full-time Dietary Aide position, range 5024, step 01, salary $7.90 p/h.
   2. Create a full-time Cook position, range 5033, step 01, salary $9.95 p/h, effective August 14, 2006.
2. Courts - MDJ Semic's Office
   1. Create a full-time Legal Clerk I position, range 1481, step 01, salary $9.26 p/h, effective August 7, 2006.

ADJOURNMENT