LOCAL GOVERNMENT COMMENTS, and personal opinions!
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Meeting contractual obligations
I have yet to see this city's administration to meet its contractual agreement in effect of keeping our workforce up to date.Ten days from a position being open the process is to begin to fill open positions. Ten days after the position is posted interviews are to be given. The total loss of man hours should be less than 30 days. I suspect that one major reason for this dragging of the feet is to save money on the labor costs of the city. But while saving these costs two things happen. One, work does not get done because of the loss of available man hours and two, the moral of the workforce becomes tainted knowing the administration may look to hire more truck drivers that do not have the proper licences, experience and education to preform in the job. It is called Executive Privilege and it is in violation of an agreed contract. Managers ill equipped in making educated decisions bring the city their own little political workforce that are unprofessional and endanger the safety of our trained workers and citizens. The savings offset the cost of revisiting the work that should have been completed before the politics were reenacted to serve the special interest of the few that are entitled to city services more than us regular taxpayers.
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3 comments:
Ari,
The DPW is short by 2 positions that were awarded advancement with in the union (not inclusive of the truck driver position filled by a non licensed laborer that is making the same money as the other truck drivers/laborers that do have their licenses, to the Sewer and Water departments. When the job becomes open, it must be posts for 10 days than interviewed and filled. The Sewer Position was filled 4 months ago leaving an opening on the DPW as a truck driver, hydraulic operator. Higher pay for a plain truck driver to move into and an opening for a new person at 40 hours. The most recent position was posted and never interviewed by the management, expanding the time for replacing personnel and falling behind in completing city maintenance.
A issue of settling a meter reader contract (that is two years late by agreement) is the pretended hold up to filling this position confusing seniority and due process. I have for years requested this contract language be closely adhered to to keep our city moving forward, but politics prevail. Check the payrolls of the DPW, see where an abnormal few collect unheard of overtime while we are short men and women.
At one time we had 40 personnel just at the DPW, and a lot less roads, sidewalks and special interest projects like the Rail Trail and Inn Street etc.
The man at the tree dump won the right to move to the DPW with his CDL and Hydraulic's license, but smoehow that is on hold, of course effecting labor availability and his pay increase due to him.
You need better managers to watch these things.
Dan Sweeney
And here it is, September 8th 2010 and these positions are still unfilled. I hear the Interum Director is holding up everything, including an agreement with the union by the Mayor due to his dislike of some Union Employees. And people question my statements on mis-management........Even the detectives who came and removed my computers looking to charge me with a criminal act! This Mayor is dangerous in my opinion.
I've never heard if the councilor at large was able to understand the contractual issues that are being violated and costing the taxpayers and ratepayers every day these agreements go ignored? The cost of not having the labor pool the Council passed and the cost of fighting with the Union contract agreements are multifold. The Union will start to tighten the wording of the contract due to the warring attitude that the interim Directors and the Mayor push forward. It has taken several months to come to an agreement on a simple truck drivers job that the interim director has stated that he 'won't' allow to happen. That is why he should not be in the position of directing personnel, personalities. The Job was posted as needing certain qualifications and I do not see where any of the people chosen to fill the Directors job have the necessary education and in some cases qualifications to safely represent our city. (Non of whom actually live here!) I hear that there were seven DPW employees on the job yesterday September 7, 2010. 7 of 19 minus the three position that the City is holding up! What a way to run a business! Oooops, businesses are supposed to make profit and and supply a product.
Dan Sweeney
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