Item 4c on next Tuesday’s Supervisors Agenda: “Discussion and Possible Action Including Approval or Denial of Requests from Department Heads and Elected Officials Regarding Budget Impacts, Funding and Recruitment of Vacant or New Positions Following the Strategic Hiring Process.”
The most prominent request to fill vacancies comes from DA David Eyster who wants to fill two experienced Deputy District Attorney positions for a total cost of about $450k (salary and benefits). Eyster’s Rationale: “The District Attorney currently has six vacant DDA positions. The District Attorney continues to have to respond to the shortage of attorneys necessary to carry out the mandates of his office. It is noted that the Superior Court is at full bench officer strength and, as such, it calendars cases with the expectation that the District Attorney's Office will have prosecutors available and prepared to staff up to six courtrooms at times per day…”
By this logic, Mendo would save more money if we didn’t have to support so many darn judges. But last we checked there were only three courtrooms handling criminal cases, not six. Eyster may need a couple more prosecutors, but not for six courtrooms.
Eyster continues: “The MCDA’s Office current staffing profile is below professional staffing to meet the obligations of the office. The professional staff are already working at a more demanding level each day than ever in the past. The attorneys can cover what needs to be done in the short term. However, if ‘status quo’ positions are not re-filled during that short term, the attorneys doubling up on the work of the missing attorneys will eventually flinch and, as a result of being overwhelmed, start making mistakes or manifest health issues caused by the increased staff. It is common knowledge that abnormal workload leads to health issues and increased use of sick leave, leave that then only exacerbates the problem. The current staffing deficit will soon lead to public safety issues.”
That could be said about a lot of Mendo offices these days which are running with short staffing and higher workloads and caseloads. Eyster may even be describing himself, since prosecutes takes more cases than your average County District Attorney.
Interestingly, the Sheriff has not asked to fill any vacancies. Nor has Auditor-Controller/Treasurer Tax Collector Chamise Cubbison.
The worst part of the agenda vacancy-hiring item package is that there is nothing from the CEO regarding the overall budget impact of the departmental hiring requests. There are no recommendations, no independent or county-wide budget analysis, and no indication of whether the funds to fill most vacancies will come from the General Fund or not, nor what the overall hit to the General Fund would be if they were all approved. The CEO simply dumps the departmental requests in the Board’s lap.
According to the CEO’s May Memo about the so-called “Strategic Hiring Process” (which is conveniently included in the agenda item materials): “Human Resources will present a monthly agenda item to the Board of Supervisors, which reviews all departmental requests to fill vacant or soon-to-be vacant positions…”
No such report has been provided.
“…Each request will include a justification outlining the necessity of the position, any legal or regulatory mandates, and the proposed funding source.”
While the staffing requests do include “justifications” (such as Eyster’s above), most of the requests do not indicate “the proposed funding source.” However, the requests from the County library do indicate that the funding would come from the Library’s dedicated sales tax, so why would those modest requests even have to go to the Board for approval?
Dumping these staffing requests on this board seems completely irresponsible. The departments are quite capable of coming up with justifications since the departments funded by the General Fund are already short staffed. How can five out of touch supervisors with no knowledge of the department operations magically decide which vacancies to fill? They might as well just throw darts at their org chart. Or maybe tell their royal highnesses the judges that Mendo just can’t afford to cater to so many of them anymore.
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