April 19, 1999 - 6:30 PM - County Board of Commissioners Meeting Minutes (Special)

10 382 April 19 , 1999 The Johnston County Board of Commissioners met in special session on Monday , April 19 , 1999 , at 6 30 pm in the Emergency Operations Center , Johnston County Law Enforcement Center , Smithfield , North Carolina , with the following members Present James H Langdon , Jr Chairman , Cookie Pope , Vice Chairman , Jerry F Wood , Eleanor N Creech , Thomas M Moore , Allen L Mims , Jr and Wade M Stewart Absent None Also Present Rick Hester , Interim County Manager , Joyce H Ennis , Clerk to the Board , and John R Massey , Finance Officer Chairman Langdon called the meeting to order , and the following business was transacted County Department Presentations 1 Human Resources J P " Pat " LaCarter , Director of Human Resources , thanked the Board for this opportunity to address the Commissioners He introduced his staff and noted the Human Resources Department is a service organization that serves both the citizens of Johnston County and the employees of County Government in the areas of personnel and human resources His staff administers the personnel ordinance , maintains files on all County employees , designs and develops personnel forms , processes job verifications and coordinates training programs They are actively involved in all stages of recruiting and filling of all open positions , administering employee benefits , addressing employee relations issues , administering the employee classification plan , and providing various training opportunities for all levels of employees In response to questions from Board members , Mr LaCarter noted the MAP's pay plan study has a number of strong points , however , there are a few areas where changes need to be made At the May meeting , he will be asking the Board to call for a public hearing on proposed amendments to the personnel ordinance In addition , he and his staff are reviewing several employee classifications and salaries that might need adjustment In particular , he addressed a major concern with the classification and the salary scale for the County's building inspectors , stressing the need for some differentiation in grade and salary for inspectors with different certifications He has been working with Rick Hester , Interim County Manager and Chief Building Inspector , C P Thompson on a proposed new salary scale that would provide a three percent increase when an inspector receives state certification , and would adjust salaries accordingly for currently certified inspectors The cost to implement the changes would be approximately 57,000 and would place these employees where they need to be in order to be competitive with the surrounding area He continued there are several other departments that are currently being reviewed , however , the inspections department is the most critical at this time since there are vacancies that need to be filled Following discussion , Commissioner Thomas M Moore moved the Board adopt the revised Code Enforcement Salary Scale as presented Commissioner Allen L Mims , Jr seconded the motion Discussion The Board asked C P Thompson if this would alleviate the problems he is experiencing with both hiring and keeping qualified inspectors for his department Mr Thompson noted this would certainly help and would allow him to proceed with filling the vacant positions he currently has with qualified inspectors that can begin making independent inspections immediately The long - term employees would also benefit as they would be compensated for the degree of expertise they have Vote The motion carried by unanimous vote Page383 2 Child Support Enforcement Jim Henderson , Director of Child Support Enforcement , outlined the services provided by his department He noted Child Support is County operated , State supervised and Federally funded His staff helps locate absent parents , establishes paternity by performing DNA tests , and establishes and enforces child support orders Current there are 5,757 active cases being handled with 4500 already under child support order He has 18 employees , and operates his agency totally with federal funds 3 Communications Department Al Gaskill , Director of Communications , informed the Board his department serves all the citizens of Johnston County and the motoring public that travels through the County , dispatching for the 24 volunteer fire departments , first responders and 9 rescue squads Funding for his operation is through ad valorem tax , and the 85 surcharge on area telephone customers for enhanced " 911 service By federal law , the use of the surcharge funds is limited and can only be used almost exclusively for upgrading and purchasing equipment and other " 911 related expenses Recently a charge has been added to cellular communications bills , however , the County is not yet receiving any benefits from this since cellular companies are non - regulated and are only required to submit funds to the State The State will then distribute 40 of the funds to the counties , ½ of which will be based on per - capita , and ½ on the number of " 911 centers in the County The County now has equipment in place that will identify cellular numbers when there are in - coming calls By 2002 , the FCC will require us to be able to locate a cellular call within approximately 400 feet In addition to Mr Gaskill , there are twelve full - time telecommunicators who work in shifts for 24 hour coverage , and one office support person who works with addressing The only request in the up - coming budget is for a new telecommunicator beginning in January , which would relieve a shift supervisor from extra duties In response to questions from the Board , Mr Gaskill noted the MAP's study placed most of his employees in the same classification and he is working with Human Resources on making some needed changes 4 Management Information Services MIS Department Leslie Stanfield , MIS Director , informed the Board her department is an internal service department that is funded 100 with ad valorem tax dollars She outlined the following points of interest about her department a Eight years ago in 1991when the department was established , there were only 3 personal computers PC's in County government with many dumb terminals being used By 1996 over 200 PC's were in place with a number of connections between buildings Currently the department has grown to seven employees servicing over 450 PC's and multiple interconnections b There are no requests for additional positions in the upcoming budget The Health , Social Services and Sheriff's Departments have first level support in - house c Johnston County has many miles of fiber cable and coax with ten locations connected and over 400 devices There is one large connection to the Internet that everyone shares The department also offers support to state agencies located in the Courthouse d PC's use Windows and or Windows NT application , and also uses Oracle Database which provides among other things the capability needed for the GIS operation which incorporates multiple levels of data at a single application e The department provides network and data security with a firewall in place for external intrusions Also provides daily enterprise backup for hardware failures and virus scanning software f 21 of the 24 fire departments are now on line thanks to PC's donated by Rex Hospital The library network is growing Plans include incorporating the rescue squads and expanding the remote sites to provide services to towns g Employees are constantly being trained on new technology Most of the staff are pursuing professional certificates h Staff works nights and weekends to minimize " down time " for other employees i Y - 2000 - staff is making sure all major applications are compliant , testing PCs ,Page384 notifying other staff to check their equipment , etc j Big picture oriented - focus is on implementing technology to streamline business processes In response to questions from Board members , Ms Stanfield explained the County is in the final stages of designing a WebPage This has been delayed in the past because the County we did not have sufficient staff to keep the information updated She also noted that in her opinion , if the Tax Department begins in - house revaluations , the County would need software upgrade Chairman James H Langdon , Jr pointed out the former County Manager , Richard Self , was largely responsible for the excellent situation the County is in concerning up - to - date technology 5 Economic Development Michael de Sherbinin , Economic Development Director , addressed the Board concerning his department He noted the new WebPage will be extremely helpful for his office as this will make information about the County much more accessible His department consists of only one additional person , who provides office support Mr de Sherbinin provided a copy of several booklets and leaflets available in his office Included were a County Profile , a Statistical Abstract , a Manufacturing Directory , specific information concerning historical traffic counts in different areas , permit statistics , public education , business information such as privilege licenses , and other pertinent data He noted that Economic Development has in place a private , non - profit , 501 - C Corporation that can be used for accepting deductible donations , obtaining options on property , holding and developing land parcels and construction and leasing of buildings His office recently participated with the different chambers of commerce to publish a book about Johnston County Future plans include the purchase of a digital camera so pictures of property and buildings can be sent electronically 6 Elections Department Teresa Davis , Elections Director , noted her office is busy even when they are not preparing for an election They process approximately 25 to 50 voter registrations daily , run jury lists , sell lists and labels to the public , and provide up - to - date directories of elected officials They conduct all elections for the County and the ten municipalities Currently a statewide voter registration program is being put in place in order to link all election departments across the state to prevent duplicate registration She noted the cost of running a countywide election is between 30,000 and 40,000 7 Veterans Service Ricky Byrd , Veterans Service Officer , informed the Board his department is funded by ad valorem tax dollars except for 2,000 from the state A bill has been introduced in the General Assembly to increase this to 4,000 He has one full - time office support person and one part - time employee The Office works primarily with veterans on benefits , but also is closely involved with the many other veterans organizations in the County There are 7,602 veterans in Johnston County with many being 65 years of age or older During the past year , the veterans in Johnston County have received over 10 million in benefits , including money for training , pensions scholarships and general education He noted that some of the older , disabled veterans are having a difficult time getting to his office due to the parking situation and the fact that there is only one wheelchair ramp and one elevator coming into the Courthouse 8 Geographic Information Services GIS Mapping Department Terry Ellis , GIS Director , addressed the Board about his department He noted he has a centralized data warehouse operation that provides multiple types of information and is accessible to a varied number of clients and customers He has 6 employees who provide services to private citizens ; professional clients such as engineers , surveyors , appraisers , realtors , attorneys , and paralegals ; State agencies ; County departments ; fire & rescue departments ; and municipalities Services include all types of maps , specified data to towns and data on CD's , applications for tax , EMS , Planing and Utilities , andPage385 special projects such as census studies His department is funded by ad valorem tax money and some fees for services He is proposing a reduction in his budget of 28 for the coming year , having purchased new equipment in last year's budget Among the goals and future needs and concerns of his department , Mr Ellis listed the need for additional space , a printer for GIS functions in the Register of Deeds office , Internet application for viewing data by all citizens , more GIS training and degree programs through Johnston Community College , and more accurate and reliable addressing information for the entire County , including data from inside the municipalities 9 Central Permitting David Lasater , Director of Central Permitting , gave a brief synopsis of the new Central Permitting Department He reviewed the past events , beginning with the planning process to incorporate into one central operation the cumulative data and functions of five County departments Planning , Environmental Health , 911 Addressing , Public Utilities , and Building Inspections He noted an extensive search was made for a software program that could accomplish this goal On January 11 , 1999 , the department opened for business in a office in the old Courthouse , but it was soon obvious the location and process was not helping the customers Additional data needed to be available , and the employees needed further training on the software The office was closed on January 12 , 1999 for further study Specifically , it was determined that a central location with all five departments under the same roof was necessary to make this work Following the unsuccessful attempt to open the office in January , the permit applications have been reviewed and are being redesigned to accommodate a central location The address databases from 911 have been converted to validate current addresses and land parcels have been converted to eliminate the need for multiple data fields A central location is being considered that will provide an ideal environment for customers and employees , and other features are being considered that will enhance customer convenience , and at the same time , provide greater employee efficiency He mentioned the possibility of an integrated voice response system that would allow customers the opportunity to check on the status and results of applications , permits and inspections by phone , generate automatic faxes , and answer other inquiries without the need of a human response This system would also have multiple possibilities for future use by other County agencies The Board thanked all the departments for their presentations , and there being no further business , Commissioner Jerry F Wood moved the Board adjourn Commissioner Cookie Pope seconded the motion , which carried by unanimous vote ____________________________________ James H Langdon , Jr , Chairman ______________________________ Joyce H Ennis , ClerkPage