Shasta County General Unit Meeting October 2011
Friday, October 21, 2011
A little over seventy (70) members attended Octobers meeting.Our Union Relations Representative, Christine Perry, started off the meeting with some thoughts on a campaign to present all of the Shasta County employees in a positive light. This would consist of Public Service Announcements (PSA’s) and purchased spots on local media stations. We are looking for a group of our Union members to form a committee to spearhead this endeavor. Christine is a communication and media specialist with many years of experience in this field.
County Administrative Officer Larry Lees then presented an overall picture on the economic health of Shasta County. Mr. Lees spoke on the following topics:
Discretionary revenue continues to decrease. Last year it was down 5% and it is down 3% this year.
“Trigger Cuts” in the state budget. Certain cuts will automatically be made if revenues do not meet there projections. These projections were down over $300 million in one month alone.
There continues to be discussions in cutting or eliminating funding to programs like CalWorks and our local schools. Schools could be closed from 10-12 days more each year with a cut in funding equal to this closure.
The State does not want any retro-contracts. This would include all costs for general assistance including employee wages.
The State prisoner release program has begun. The State has sent in about $100,000 in seed money to start the program.
Mr. Lees personally looks at all jobs hired in his “Controlled Hiring Process”.
Public entity’s across the state have averaged about 10% in layoffs. Shasta County layoffs totaled approximately 2.5%, and all but two employees have been returned back to work.
Mr. Lees is opposed to furloughs as it is only a temporary fix except in small departments of about ten employees or fewer.
Mr. Lees believes that numerous jobs have been saved in Shasta County because of the sacrifices and support of the County workforce.
Of the 58 California Counties Shasta County ranks around 29 or 30. California has the 8th largest economy in the world.
Shasta County was forced to borrow approximately $2 million from reserves for law enforcement.
The Shasta County current reserve is at 2-3% of the budget and should be 5-10%.
The good news is that Shasta County is financially stable, unlike some of our neighboring counties.
The CAO is afraid of burning out employees and he is looking at ways to recognize employees without a cost.
Discussion on the current health insurance and administrations desire to go to a two tiered plan. The healthcare liability for our county is 100-140 million annually.
The CAO has created a tri-fold document letting the public know what the employees do for the citizens of our county.
The employees responded that they are all stressed out to the maximum and no one can afford any more cuts to salary or benefits.
There was discussion on the inequity of salaries and benefits between line staff and management.
The employees spoke to excessive workloads because of eliminated or vacant positions.
Currently we have employees who are eligible and receiving some of the same services we manage for the rest of the community.
It is difficult to retain employees with lowered salaries and benefits.
There were several questions asked of Mr. Lees that he wrote down and stated that he would have to research. Mr. Lees promised to get the answers back to me so I can publish them on this website.
The employees thanked Mr. Lees for his time and his candid comments about the County’s economy.
Our next meeting will be held on November 29, 2011 (Tuesday) starting at 5:30PM at 1800 Park Marina Drive.