Let Us Know What You Think

This is probably just about my last constituent service post; as you probably know, I'm retiring from the Board as of 12/31/19. Clark Oliver has been elected as the next County Rep from the 11^th District, and I couldn't be happier about that. His contact info will be up on the County site right after the first of the year.

Important stuff happening, though. The County Manger process is entering its final phase: the Board heard the Local Law establishing the position at our full Board meeting last Wednesday, and agreed to pass it along to second reading and public hearing, which will occur before the next full Board meeting, on December 4.

But more important than that are the public information meetings, scheduled for Oneonta and Cooperstown, which will be more informal and will provide an opportunity to hear the plan for County Manger in some detail, and to provide input. They're coming up soon:

• Oneonta – City Hall – 7:00 PM Novemer 14
• Cooperstown – County Courthouse – 7:00 PM November 19

It may seem like it's all of a sudden, but we've been working on this for the entire eight years I've been on the Board, and it's been a project for decades before that. A lot of thought, work, research, and conversation has gone into the journey to this particular moment. These two info sessions are your opportunity to get into the conversation. You may speak at the public hearing in December 4, of course, but I'd suggest attending one of the info session for an opportunity for a more robust conversation.

Of course, please contact your Representative as well, if you'd like. Until the end of December, that's still me, if you're in Ward 1 or 2.

Oh- and if you'd like some input on the Otsego County 2020 budget, come up to Cooperstown at 6PM on November 26 and let us know about it.

Live on the Board IX a - More Solid Waste

A few more items regarding solid waste. This topic, or variations on it, will no doubt come up in debates or in conversations as you're campaigning. Most folks are aware of the recyclable cost crisis, and are concerned that it, as opposed to a lot of other 'crucial' issues, will have an observable effect on them.

• Glass: Glass is the heaviest component of our recyclable stream, and re-directing it would make a big difference. Andela, In Richfield Springs, will apparently take all the glass we bring them, and Karen Sullivan has been talking with Ommegang and other big glass recyclers about getting their glass to Andela. This is ongoing; transportation on a regular basis is an issue.
• Cardboard: There will soon be a separate bin at the Transfer Stations for cardboard. A market has been found, at least for the time being.
• Mattresses (and box springs) – For the last few years, we have been charging $25/mattress (or box spring) at the TS s and storing them in a trailer. When the trailer is full, a company called Triad, from the Buffalo area, comes and takes it away, and charges us a fee. They take the matt/bs apart and recycle everything. We generally break even financially. There has been some talk, and a little investigation, about establishing a recycling center here in Oneonta, perhaps run by ARC Otsego.
• Speaking of ARC Otsego, they are running one of the great places in Oneonta – the Reuse Center, on the corner of Duane and West Broadway, just off River St. They have two warehouses, and they take anything that's reasonably usable, price it and sell it. It's like the world's biggest tag sale, and it's keeping tons of stuff out of the landfills. Everything from big jars of small screws to all the student desks from SUCO's recent remodeling.
• Syrofoam – and speaking of the Reuse Center, they also have a styrofoam densifier, which takes clean white styrofoam and compresses it into standard sized blocks that styrofoam manufacturers will buy. Karen Sullivan helped with the grant that enabled ARC Otsego to buy the densifier.
• Electronics – NYS used to provide a grant that paid for half of County expense for processing electronics, which have their own regulated waste stream. That grant has gone away, and prices are going up. We contract with a company that will – for that increasing price – take electronic materials and process them appropriately. Just a month or so ago, SWEC voted to charge $12 for each TV or monitor (we still get a startling high number of CRT monitors).
• Ag plastic – You may have seen those big hay bales out in the fields, wrapped in white plastic, or the very long white plastic cylinders used to store ground silage. It's single use plastic, and in the spring there are tons of it each year. Often it is buried or burned, both illegal. Soil and Water has a machine that compresses this stuff into large blocks, and we have had about a half-dozen one-day events where farmers can bring the plastic in for free. However, the market for these compressed plastic blocks, never robust, has dried up.

So there are – and have been – some significant initiatives focused on keeping materials out of the waste stream and recycling them responsibly. This is important not only because of the suddenly-high recycling costs, but because there is a finite amount of space in existing NYS landfills, and no one is optimistic about the State approving any more in the near future.

Much – perhaps most – of this work has been done by Karen Sullivan and her excellent Planning and Solid Waste Department team. Since the end of MOSA, we have also had Casella as a collaborative partner, as well. I'd be the first to cast suspicions on the motives of a corporation, but Casella's goals are aligned with ours and we've solved a lot of problems together.

Life on the Board IX - Sold Waste

Today's topic: Solid waste. Delightful.

I've been on the Solid Waste and Environmental Concerns Committee (SWEC) for about four years, and before that I attended meetings pretty regularly, mostly because of the second half of the Committee's name. That's where I heard two of the five members (including the Chair) agree that “climate change is not settled science.” We've come a long way since then – but I digress.

In NY, counties have statutory responsibility for recycling. They can outsource it, if they like, but they have to make sure it happens. Counties have no statutory responsibility for solid waste, although many have a hand it it, including Otsego County.

In 1989, Schoharie, Montgomery and Otsego Counties entered into an agreement to create a collaborative waste management authority. This was MOSA,which had a 25 year life span and could be re-upped at that time. 2014 came and MOSA was dissolved. There had been massive difficulties and differences of opinions, and expenses had skyrocketed. The story of MOSA is very, very long and unpleasant, for the most part, and best left for the history books (for more detail, go to otsego11.blogspot.com and search “MOSA”).

So, since 2014, Otsego County has had its own public-private system. The County owns the two transfer stations: Southern TS, on Silas Lane, out by Exit 13 in Oneonta, between the City water treatment plant and OCSD's bus garage, and Northern, off Rt. 28, a little more than a mile north of Cooperstown. Casella Waste Systems operates the transfer stations. The 'tipping fee' – the charge for each ton of trash delivered to either TS – is now $80; Casella charges us $79.75/ton to operate the TS s, so we make a quarter on each ton.

This is pretty straightforward, although there are separate systems and contracts for such things as mattresses, electronics, agricultural plastic, metal, brush, etc. But the big issue recently has been recyclables.

Up until last year, recyclables were taken at the TS s for free, since we (Casella) could find a MRF (materials recovery facility, pronounced “murph”) that would take it for free, or, from time to time (especially in the more distant past) pay us for the load.

However, you have probably heard of the massive worldwide disruption caused by China's “National Sword” initiative, about a year and a half ago, when, practically overnight, they stopped taking almost all of the world's recyclables. New water quality standards, and a lot of other factors, combined to lead the Chinese to require almost impossible cleanliness standards for recyclables.

Long story, and I can fill in more, or you can read about it almost anywhere online, but suddenly it's costing a whole lot of money to dispose of our recyclables – if we can find a MRF to take them. Right now, it's (a lot) more expensive to take a ton of recyclables to a MRF than it is to take a ton of trash to a landfill. Otsego County charges commercial haulers $55/ton to bring recyclables to the TS s, although citizens can still bring recyclables to the TS s and put them in the bins for free.

There's no end in sight, and although alternate strategies for storing and processing recyclables are slowly emerging, the fiscal difficulties will continue for some time. SWEC has recently authorized raising the tipping fee a couple of dollars, and has raised the recyclables fee to $75/ton, starting 1/1/20. This will ease, but not solve, the problem.

You are probably aware that any time the County raises the cost of anything, it's a high-profile and difficult action. These fee increases (and another increase – charging $12 for any TV or monitor) were debated at really great length. The focus of the conversations was how to apply the increase to those who use the service, and how to incentivize certain kinds of behavior, such as cleaning your recyclables. The tip fee is charged to commercial haulers, who may or may not pass on any increases to their customers (you can still bring a bag of garbage to the TS for $3). We can also manipulate the size of the solid waste user fee, which is an annual fee charged to each household in the county. Larger organizations (including non-profits, which pay no property taxes) pay multiples of the user fee, depending on size. Raising the user fee (now $15) spreads the cost among all County citizens pretty evenly. We raised the user fee last year. Eventually, we decided that we wanted larger users to pay a bigger part of the increase (and we didn't want to raise the user fee two years in a row).

I guess I've gone on and on about solid waste – something that was farthest from my mind when I first ran for the Board. This is a jack-of-all-trades job – and not for the first time, I look forward to a County Administrator to bring some professional knowledge and experience to each piece of this job.

I've only scratched the surface here – and I'll write again about some of the details – but it's something that will continue to need to be addressed in 2020 and beyond. Let me know what parts of this you'd like to know more about.

By the way – Delaware County Solid Waste will have an open house on November 9. Delaware has been way ahead of other rural counties in bringing creative initiatives to fruition in this area – including operating their own MRF. Even though I'll soon be done with all this, I'll be going to the open house, just because I've heard so much about them for so long.

Life on the Board VIII - Miscellaneous 1

Some odds and ends while I have a moment (just got back from a week and a half away) -

Purchasing: About five years ago, or so, we began the process of outsourcing our purchasing management to Onondaga County, based on a relationship that a one-term Board member had with somebody in that organization. It's been a very, very long and difficult transition which has only really settled in during the last year or so.

Onondaga County (including the City of Syracuse) has a pretty massive purchasing system, and had never collaborated with a County before. We pay them $30,000/year for the service, which is about 1/3 of what it would cost us to create one position here in Otsego County. Before all this, each Department pretty much did their own purchasing (there was a half-time clerk in the Personnel office who did it for a while, but that didn't work out). The transition took so long because change is hard, and because Departments didn't like giving up autonomy, and because Onondaga County took some time to learn how to integrate us into their pretty well-oiled machine. It didn't help that the Onondaga County Purchasing Director left his position about a year into the collaboration, to work for NYS.

However, all things considered, everyone's been working hard to make this work, and Andrew Trombley, the new Onondaga County Purchasing Director, has been very responsive. As you may know, there are a lot of restrictions on municipal purchasing, to ensure fairness with the public's money and to restrict corruption, and when done right, purchasing is just awash in bureaucracy and takes forever. But there's a great advantage to doing it right, and it's usually worth the wait. We haven't heard about any real problems in this area for over a year.

Vehicles: Otsego County uses a lot of vehicles, and most of them by far are used by DSS: caseworkers are expected to be able to access any home in the county if necessary, transport out-of-county for a lot of reasons, etc. DSS has had a transportation coordinator for a long time because of this.

General and routine maintenance was done by the Highway Department until staff cuts during the economic downturn left Highway with half the staff they had ten years earlier, and no time to work on County cars.

A few years ago the Public Works Committee started looking at outsourcing our vehicle purchases and maintenance. I believe that there were two (three?) proposals, and we chose Enterprise. They lease us cars on a schedule, cycling them in and out on a four-year rotation. The best estimates they and the Treasurer can provide suggest that we'll save money. We've been doing this for about a year or so, and so far, so good. We have control over whether we keep the car (extend the lease) or not, which is a good thing: Enterprise's schedule doesn't really take into account how the cars are used. There's a hazmat truck that Emergency Services uses for specific situations. It's five years old, so Enterprise wanted us to replace it – but it's only got 16,000 miles on it. In addition, DSS – which has been making decisions about cars for decades – is requesting that a few of their cars be kept another year or so, for a variety of reasons.

Everyone agrees that we won't know if this whole system is cost-effective until a whole four-year leasing cycle is over.

AIM payments: I am not familiar with AIM payments (Aid and Incentives to Municipalities), mostly because it is State funding to cities, towns and villages for them to do with as they see fit. However, this year, there's a new way to pay for them:  County sales-tax payments from the State will be reduced by the amount of the AIM payment totals within each County. In other words, the State no longer has to pay AIM – the County does.

The justification here, such as it is, is that the new Internet sales tax payments will make up the difference. We'll see; I'm betting not. This is generally seen by counties as a very bad thing.

Some other NYS initiatives that will cost the County money – and for which the state has provided some compensatory funding :

• Early voting: It costs more than I realized to run an election, and when you keep polling places open for over a week (October 26 through November 3 this year) before the regular Election Day, it's going to cost a whole lot more. Early voting in Otsego County will only be available at the Board of Elections office in the Meadows County Office Building, but will probably be expanded in future years.
• Raise the Age: This initiative moves the age of adult responsibility from 16 to 17 (October 1, 2018) and then to 18 (October 1, 2019). So as of next week, individuals charged with a crime who are 18 and younger will be treated as minors, not adults, by the court system. The big cost here is if someone who is 18 or under needs to be incarcerated. This is rare in the world of minors convicted of a crime, but by raising the age, the possibility increases.  Of course, Probation and DSS, and others, will now be taking on caseloads of 16, 17 and !8 year olds in a variety of their programs.
• Court of First Appearance (CAFA) and cashless bail – and other justice system reforms – I would check with members of the Public Safety Committee for more details.

And, finally, Otsego County is, obviously, part of the Susquehanna River watershed, since we boast one of the sources of the river, Lake Otsego. Counties in this watershed, in NY, PA and MD, are members of (I cannot for the life of me remember the name of the organization), and are responsible for a certain level of water quality reaching the Chesapeake Bay. The Otsego County Soil and Water District does a lot of work in this area, including buffer tree plantings and environmental education in the agricultural sector (fertilizer runoff and sediment are the biggest problems).

County Administrator timeline, Which Is A Very Big Deal

At the IGA 'second meeting' yesterday, a timeline for moving on the County Manager* position was laid out.

There was general agreement that the Board as now constituted is in favor of moving forward (but not necessarily unanimously).  So here's what we hope will happen, and when -

- The IGA Committee will send all the job descriptions and local laws it has collected to Ellen Coccoma, County Attorney, so she can begin drafting our local law (first) and our job description (later).

- Ellen will come to the first IGA meeting in September (Sept. 10, 9AM) to talk about details of the local laws, ask the Committee questions, etc.

- Ellen will present a draft to the IGA at their second meeting in September (Sept. 24, 9AM).

- The IGA Committee will formally present their proposal for a CM/CA at the full Board meeting on October 2.  Debate will be encouraged.

- It takes a while to prepare a local law for passage, including announcing it at one (two?) Board meetings and then having a public hearing (usually right before a Board meeting).  Most of our required public hearings attract no speakers from the public, mostly because they're addressing pretty abstruse issues.  But this one might attract opponents.

- Vote on the local law during the December Board meeting (Dec 4). 

We talked about a six-month search process (beginning, obviously, after the local law is approved).  The job description would be completed by the time this process begins.  We want to be thorough, careful and patient.  The Committee voted to request $75,000 in the 2020 budget for salary, fringe and staffing.  There has only been general discussion about staffing, focusing on an administrative assistant, full or part time.  This may be a new position, or one that uses existing staff in the Board Clerk's or Treasurer's office.

The fact that we've established a timeline and are talking specifics is a very big deal.  This is something the Board has been talking about and debating for around 25 years. 

* Actually, I think there was consensus on using the term County Administrator, as it more accurately describes what we want - not a Manager in authority over Department Heads, but someone who will provide administrative assistance and leadership. 

Life on the Board VII - Homelessness

Our topic for today is homelessness.  This is a little more extensive and comprehensive, since I"ve been in the middle of all this for all eight of my years on the Board.

In NYS, Counties have some substantial responsibility for providing services to the homeless population. In Otsego County, this costs taxpayers about $1M/year., which is a lot of money. Until recently, that money went to local hotels, mostly in Oneonta, at the rate of $50/night/person.

It's still $50/night/person to house a homeless individual in a hotel, but we have, over a somewhat long period of time (4-5 years) been developing some alternatives.

CROSSROADS: One of our solutions kind of fell in our lap in about the best possible way. Out on State Rte. 7, between Oneonta and Otego, is an old motel called The Crossroads (that's what it's called now; I don't know what it was called when it was still a motel). A number of years ago, a couple bought the property and turned it into a half-way house for people recovering from addiction – mostly, people coming out of rehab and trying to re-integrate into that dangerous world that hadn't worked out so well the last time.

Brad and Noel took this on as a faith-driven mission, at least in part. They provided support, encouragement, personal investment, and drove their clients to job interviews, services appointments, and anything else that might give them a leg up. There were a variety of reimbursement sources, but a great deal of their revenue came from rent charged to, and paid by, the clients themselves.

Maybe around three years ago, their lives took a turn that required them to look for a more reliable financial base, and they, and Otsego County DSS, devised a creative solution: DSS would pay for every one of Crossroads fourteen (I think) rooms every night of the year, and would be charged $35/night/person, a $15/night/person savings over what we were already doing.*

It was DSS's job to make sure that every one of the rooms was occupied every night – we paid even if the room was empty. Empty rooms have not, since then, been a problem.

Doing the math, which is not my forte, seems to suggest that if the system worked perfectly (all rooms full every night) the savings would amount to $76,660 in a year. Reports I have seen indicate that the system is working to a capacity in the mid-90s, percentage-wise, and that money is being saved. Considering that Crossroads also provides transport and whatever casework they can, it's an even better deal than that.

Brad and Nicole recently applied for a DSRIP ** grant of around $82,000 to support more casework services, and some other services. They got the grant, so the quality of this collaboration will improve even more.

TINY HOMES - There are Counties which own properties designed to house homeless individuals. We're not jumping into this realm with both feet yet ***– just the NIMBY challenges alone are daunting – but we are in the midst of providing homeless individuals with a place to stay that is owned by the County. It's called the Tiny Homes project.

If you're not familiar with the Tiny Homes movement, it's a fascinating idea that's worth a Google. Basically, they're what they say they are: houses that are around 400 square feet and smaller. The Otsego County Planning Department collaborated on a $350,000 grant to build a few Tiny Homes on the empty land behind the Meadows County Office Building. The building trades program at Delhi Ag and Tech (I believe it was the Residential Tech program, but not sure) teamed up with us to build the homes, for the cost of the materials alone, and we wrote other grants for other parts of the project, like a small community center (washer/dryer, social hall, interview room) and the geothermal heating/cooling systems.

Right now, the pads have been prepared and two units are in place. The social hall is under construction, and the geothermal folks will be on site soon (the buildings will be powered by solar panels). Security is being developed, hopefully as part of an existing contract. There is already regular public transit service to the Meadows. And the casework can be coordinated right from the Meadows itself, since DSS has a variety of services based there.

Again, my wobbly-at-best math suggests that each unit, if occupied each night all year, will save us $18,250. And remember – we haven't paid a dime for this system as of this point, and we're not likely to pay much, if anything, for heating and cooling. There are a few very persistent cases of homelessness – individuals who, for a variety of reasons, are homeless for very long periods of time – and right now the plan is to populate the Tiny Homes with these folks.

We have a long way to go here, even with Crossroads and Tiny Homes. At best, given, say, five Tiny Homes, we will solve less than half of our $1M fiscal problem. However, twenty homeless individuals each night will be getting a much more significant chance to move on – to get a sustainable foothold in the housing market – than was true before.

Which brings us to the inevitable next step: providing adequate affordable housing in Otsego County, so homelessness will be, at worst, only temporary. “Affordable housing in Otsego County” is a massive topic, and although it is probably the number-one long-term issue for the County Board to address, I'm not going to try to summarize it this time. There are a couple of serious proposals for large (for this area) affordable housing projects that are currently being discussed – the Riverside Apartments and the “Lofts on Dietz Street” project – each with it's own opportunities and challenges. But anything that increases the stock of affordable housing in Otsego County is going to have a positive effect on all levels of our population.

PS: A twist on the homelessness issue that was added about a year and a half ago, was the Governor's initiative called “Code Blue.” This changes the rules regarding accepting homeless individuals into shelters when the weather gets dangerously cold. Details here. “Warming Stations” have, and continue to be, developed, mostly in Oneonta.

PPS:  PPS:  Opportunities for Otsego operates a homeless shelter in Oneonta, and they charge us $75/night/person.  They are by far the best options for families - really the only good option.  More here.

* - I tend to say “we” because I'm the Chair of the Human Services Committee, which oversees DSS. I take no credit for any of the great creative stuff they do.

** - DSRIP is a State funding stream dedicated to support the Medicaid redesign (which is another whole big thing). For further details, Google: NYS Medicaid takeover DSRIP.

*** - There are some very, very preliminary investigations at the moment into some funding which may expand our ability to do this.

Life on the Board - VI - County Manager

Let's talk about a County Manager.

I've hesitated writing about the top issue we're moving on at the moment because it's such a long, drawn-out, complex, controversial issue.

And then I thought again, and decided, “No it's not. It's pretty simple.”

Let's start with this: What $115M/yr corporation that you know of is functioning without some sort of unitary executive leadership? In business, they're called CEOs. In Counties, they're called Managers, or Administrators, or Executives.

The arguments for some sort of executive county governance are many. First, as above, they always do it in business, because you need a central authority for communications, planning, decision-making, etc. Second, what might be called the County's “executive functioning” is currently being done by fourteen part-time laymen who serve two-year terms. What could possibly go wrong? Third, believe it or not, up until two years ago, when we instituted Department Head meetings, there did not exist – I'll repeat: did not exist – any formal structure for Departments to communicate with each other. Fourth, a central executive will be able to reduce redundancy in County functioning and purchasing. Fifth, a central executive will be able to take on the roles of Budget Office (now residing in the Treasurer's office), purchasing liaison, fleet manager, etc. And take on a large part of the Department Head evaluation role. And approve smaller expenditures and transfers, and authorize the filling of vacant funded positions, execute contracts, and negotiate with the unions. And so on and so on.

Currently, Committees spend an enormous amount of their time doing a lot of this stuff that the executive could take care of. That would free up time for the Committees to... oh, I don't know... maybe do some planning... policy... and so forth: the stuff we are elected to do and have, for the most part, not done in the past.

A note on terminology: I have been using the word “executive” with a lower-case 'e', meaning “central management.” One thing Otsego County won't have is a County Executive, with an upper-case 'E'. That decision has been made. A County Executive is someone who is elected in a county-wide election, serves at the pleasure of the voters, and has a authority, to a great extent, independent of the Board. County Executives are, generally (but not entirely) found in larger counties in NYS.

(Fun fact:  Otsego County is tied with Columbia County as the largest County in NYS without any kind of central adminstrator.)

County Managers and County Administrators are employees of the County who are hired by the Board and serve at the pleasure of the Board. There's not a lot of important difference between a CM and CA. What level of authority the CM or CA has throughout the various departments, and what their functions would be, is determined by the Board when we establish the job description.

The County Manager issue has been handled in the Intergovernmental Affairs Committee (IGA), and Chair Meg Kennedy (who's been doing a really good job in this area) has held a second IGA meeting each month to discuss county governance. I go to as many of these second IGA meetings as I can, and have strongly encouraged all Board members to participate as well. The next “second meeting” is on Tuesday, August 27, in the Committee Room on the second floor of the Count Office Building. It's a public meeting.

I was being a little offhand when I said this wasn't really a complex issue. But the bones of it are pretty straightforward. If I can master the technology, I'll put a “starting point” draft County Manager job description in the next post. Please let me know what further directions you'd like to take this particular conversation.

Thanks

Just wanted to give a shout out to 'anonymous' who wrote to me to tell me he/she reads this blog and is interested in the current series (Life on the Board).

Also - anonymous: you noted that you are a "future constituent."  If this means you are moving into District 11 in the near future, then I look forward to representing you.  But if it means that you're too young to vote and therefore feel you aren't a constituent - I already represent you. 

I represent everyone who lives or works in the City's 1st and 2nd Wards, no matter their age, their party registration, their voting status, or even their citizenship.  Everybody, with no one left out.

I love this job!

Life on the Board V - Raises

Let's talk about raises.

Facts first: there are, essentially, two types of County employees. There are union employees, members of one of the three units operating in the County (Correction Officers, Sheriff's Deputies, and CSEA (everyone else). All the rest of the County employees (including Reps and other Electeds) are Management and Confidential, universally known as M&C.

Union employee's salaries are laid out in the contract, which includes specific percentage raises that will be applied in each year of the contract. So Union folks always know what their salary will be, practically to the penny, for the next few years that the contract covers.

Here's how M&C salaries are determined: At the January Board meeting, there is a resolution which lists each position and the salary attached to that position for the coming year. That's it.

How is that list assembled? Usually at the Budget Committee, at some point. And if you think that this is a system that's ripe for abuse, you'd be right.

The assumption has always been that the M&C salaries will start the budget process for the next year unchanged from the previous year, and if there's any money available at the end, they might get a raise. There's never any money left at the end. Before 2019, M&C employees went 11 years with only one raise (and not all of them got it).

This is an issue that I have been pursuing for about four or five years, and I think we're approaching the finish line. Just one more major issue to address: an ongoing salary scale that is automatically applied each year.

A few years ago, we got $50,000 added to the budget for a comprehensive salary study, comparing our salaries to salaries in comparable counties in NYS. Due to some really frustrating complications and, frankly, the fact that no competent organizations responded to our Request for Proposals, it was a year later when we just decided to do the study ourselves. I had already compared upstate counties on a large number of factors, and we chose 18 of them to study. Penney Gentile and her Personnel staff sent out detailed salary surveys to those counties, and followed up, and followed up, and followed up. They were great, and we got what I think is some really reliable data.

What we found was that Otsego County was dead last, salarywise, for most M&C positions studied. Overall, the picture was atrocious. We had kind of known this; in casual conversation, Department Heads – who spend a lot of time collaborating with their peers across the state – let us know that our county was a well-known outlier in terms of salary.

To make a long and complicated story short, the Budget Committee did an astounding thing last fall – they proposed pay raises for all M&C employees that would put their salaries right at the average paid across the comparable counties. This was way better than I expected, and right now, our M&C employees are just a bit below average (the study was done in 2018, with salary data up through 2017, so our folks are actually getting the 2017 average; everyone in the other counties have gotten two raises since then).

So the final hurdle: how do we set up a scale that provides reasonable raises to M&C every year? The PRGS Committee debated this for a year – 2018.

The Performance Review and Goal Setting Committee (PRGS), of which I've been Chair for a few years, and a member of for all my 8 years, works in two year cycles. In the second year of the Reps term (after new Reps have had a year to learn the ropes and get to know everyone involved) we facilitate Performance Evaluations for all Department Heads. That's what we're doing right now. During the first year of a term (for instance, 2018 and 2020), we discuss issues related to staffing, evaluation, compensation, and anything else that seems relevant. For a number of cycles we created and refined the Department Head evaluation forms and the system for evaluation, which was much more complex (and long) than one might think. In 2018 we attacked the M&C salary issue, worked with Penney to do the salary study, and came to some general conclusions regarding M&C salary scale and merit pay issues.

So we're ready to ask the Budget Committee to consider all this – I've got to write it up and send it out soon. Here's the proposal – not a hill to die on, but the beginning of a conversation:

Department Heads

• 1.5% raise annually
• Another 1.5%, in increments of 0.5%, depending on outcome of latest Performance Evaluations

Non- Department Heads

• Same increment as CSEA contract

An important reason why this is essential to do is that, in the last few years, there have been union employees whose salary has risen above that of their supervisor. This is a demoralizing situation, for sure, for the M&C supervisor, but in addition, when the supervisor leaves, what motivation does the union employee have to apply for the supervisor's position? In addition, we found that we were hiring and training employees only to see them take a job in a different (often nearby) county for significantly more money.

So that's it. I've simplified some and left a lot out, but this should be enough to understand why you might hear that the County is talking about raises for County employees.

Life on the Board - IV

I thought it might be important to talk about some of the issues that are front and center at this time. There are dozens and dozens of things that are in progress at any given time. There are over 25 Departments, depending on how you want to define the term, and every department is constantly acting, responding, planning, collaborating, etc.

Most of this is taken care of at the Department level, and perhaps discussed at Parent Committee. But there are some big things that we, the Board, really need to be working on at this point, things that I just listed in a previous communication.

HIGHWAY GARAGE – The main highway garage has not been used for a couple of years because it is so structurally unsound that it must be torn down (which means that vehicles have been outside, year-round, for a long time). Funds for this demolition project – in the six figure range – were budgeted for last year, but it wasn't done, and they're in the budget this year. No word on any preliminary plans for starting the project.

Part of the problem is long-term planning: should we stay on Linden Avenue in Cooperstown? There are a lot of problems with keeping the site, including the fact that it's cramped and is adjacent to the Cooperstown CS campus. The land is probably worth a lot. Moving, on the other hand, is a monumental undertaking, and there's always the possibility of a brownfield issue. A year ago there was some talk of buying some land adjacent to OAOC in Milford, and creating a common transportation facility for BOCES, Milford CS, and the County (and any other entity that was interested). This may still be included in our shared services grant proposal.

242 MAIN ST., ONEONTA - The County maintains an office building in downtown Oneonta (right next to Autumn Cafe) which is used primarily by the Mental Health Clinic (which also includes addiction services). Its probably been three or more years since there were conversations about selling the building and moving to a more efficient space. The chief motivator for this initiative was (and still is) the need for security in the building. Given the clientele, there are occasional incidents which may become dangerous without some kind of security services.

Security is problematic in this building because there are three entrances, and estimates ranged up to $200,000 a year for access security focused on all three. In the frustrating way that large organizations operate, we have talked and worried and problem-solved for these three years, and still there is no security at all in the building.

Complicating the issue is the fact that the City showed a good deal of interest in buying the building and including it in the DRI. Also, there are other County Departments who would like an Oneonta presence and are looking at space in the building (for instance, DSS, Probation, Public Defender,etc.).

After some pressure from Oneonta Reps to make a decision, the Public Works Committee recommended that we keep the building and provide appropriate security. At the present, we are still talking about what kind of security would be best (contract with a private company? Hire retired DA investigators? Etc.).

PUBLIC SAFETY BUILDING - The “Old Jail” is next to the Cooperstown County Office Building and the Courthouse. The current Public Safety Building was built (I think) around 25 years ago, and needs some major renovations, due partly to age, and partly to new technology and requirements. After a couple of years of talking, the money for the renovations is in the budget this year. It's a $1.5M project; we've borrowed $1M, and budgeted $0.5M in the 2019 budget. It should be done by the end of this year.

This is only a start on renovations that the Sheriff has asked for. New “pod” architecture (requiring rebuilding much of the jail) would reduce the number of Correction Officers needed. However, recent changes in State law (most prominently, cashless bail) may reduce the number of inmates coming through our facility. On the other hand, we could “board out” extra beds, providing them for other counties' overflow, for a fee.

EMERGENCY SERVICES TRAINING CENTER - I know very little about this project – just that it needs to be replaced. The current facility is off Hemlock Road in Oneonta, next to Medicoaches. There are lots of people and groups county-wide who are involved in planning for this, and it is taking a long time to come to the set of conclusions that would lead to the next step.

COUNTY MANAGER - As you know, this has been going on for ten years or more. It really deserves an essay of its own, so I'll put that on the list. We may have a decision by the end of this year.

Again, just scratching the surface on all of these.

By the way, feel free to contact any of the Board Reps for more details on subjects that are handled in their Committee. Committee assignments can be found here.