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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2011-07-27 Merit Appeals Board Minutesr'% Aloftk Hilo, Hawaii Wednesday, July 27, 2011 The regular meeting of the Merit Appeals Board, County of Hawaii, was held in the conference room of the Department of Human Resources, 101 Pauahi Street, Suite 2, Hilo, Hawaii, on Wednesday, July 27, 2011. Present: Mr. Gary Yoshiyama, Chair Mr. Kenneth Rowe, Vice Chair Mr. Henry "Hank" Silva, Member Mr. Brian De Lima, Member Mr. Ronald K. Takahashi, Director of Human Resources Ms. Diane Noda, Deputy Corporation Counsel Ms. Yumi Nakamura, Clerk III Ms. Velma Y. Menezes, Secretary - Reporter Chair Yoshiyama called the meeting to order at 9 :30 a.m. ADDENDUM TO AGENDA Ms. Noda noted that at the Board's meeting last month, they had discussed amending Rule 100 -6, meetings. However, today's agenda inadvertently refers to Rule 100 -11, performance evaluation. According to HRS 92 -7, the Board can amend the agenda with a two- thirds recorded vote only if the item to be added to the agenda is not of reasonable major importance and action thereon would not affect a significant number of persons. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved to amend the agenda to change item B under New Business to "develop rule changes to the Rules of the Civil Service Commission/Merit Appeals Board, Title II." The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. Hawai`i County is an Equatopportunity Provider andEmpfoyer. /•� 10 � MINUTES OF JUNE 23.2011 Ms. Noda asked that the minutes be amended on page 6, paragraph 1, regarding their discussion on Rule 100 -6, to reflect "a liberal interpretation is that the Board can change the meeting d_,y" and delete the last sentence of the paragraph. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved that the minutes of June 23, 2011 be approved as amended. The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. UNFINISHED BUSINESS A) Finalize draft letter for annual evaluation of Director of Human Resources for calendar year 2010 Chair Yoshiyama noted that the letter is for the fiscal year and not calendar year. There were two drafts of the letter available for discussion. Draft 1 has more detail, while Draft 2 is more general. When asked, Mr. Takahashi stated that he prefers Draft 2, although he has no problem with either one. Chair Yoshiyama added that the minutes of their June 23 meeting reflect the numerous comments on the evaluation by the Board members, the Mayor, and the Managing Director. MOTION: Mr. Silva moved to use Draft 2 as the final evaluation letter. The motion was seconded by Mr. De Lima and unanimously carried. NEW BUSINESS A) Formulate procedures for annual evaluations of the Director of Human Resources 2 /"'k A*"%` Ms. Toriano recalled that the task presented at the last meeting was to collect evaluation forms that were being used by different groups. The packet before the Board has a total of five. Her perception from the last discussion was that one of the challenges they faced was obtaining feedback that could be used to complete the evaluation. With that being said, the first form, the Hawaii County Merit Appeals Board Evaluation Questionnaire, was the last document used at the time Mike Ben was being evaluated; and it was designed to obtain feedback from user groups. The user group consists of primarily the Mayor and the departments. Ms. Toriano is not comfortable in saying is that they deal a lot with the public. In HR, they tend to deal more internally as a service department. Other documents included the Chief of Police, Fire Chief, Hawaii Health Systems Corporation, and the Kauai jurisdiction evaluation forms. Criteria common in all of these documents include areas such as fiscal, ability to plan and organize, responsiveness to the users. Of course, for Police and Fire there is that public element that they're evaluating. Mr. Silva stated that the tool he found most productive, although they all would have to be modified, is the Chief of Police's evaluation, which is shorter and to the point. A couple of elements can be pulled out, but he's looking along the lines of criteria 10. He also suggested perhaps putting a notice in the paper to solicit comments about the evaluation and include a deadline for submitting comments. The Board might also want to designate one of the members to put something together as a starting point and everybody can take it apart after that. Mr. De Lima recalled that at the last meeting, he referred to the State's form that they use for their top administrators, one of them who was the former EUTF administrator who now serves on the Board of Education. He will look through his materials and share with the Board that evaluation form. He thinks the State's form allows for a more constructive process, because what it does is forces the administrator to first come up with specific objectives that are proposed to the Board for the upcoming year. They all agree on the assigned value of each of the objectives, then based upon the agreed -upon objectives at the beginning of the year, the administrator is evaluated. This process is not too far apart from what Mr. Silva was saying, and it forces an articulation and then acceptance. 3 /'% "'001A Mr. Silva agreed with Mr. De Lima's comments, noting that that philosophy is more for the Board's type of management. They're not here every day, seeing everything, so that criteria are easier to judge; and of course there will be other measures too. Chair Yoshiyama noted that the other element to the above evaluation is the self - critique. He also stated that Kauai's came closest to what he was looking for. He asked Mr. Takahashi whether he had a strategic plan with vision and mission statements, goals, actions, etc. If Mr. Takahashi has that, it would serve as a basis. Mr. Takahashi responded that he does have a strategic plan and has periodical discussions with the division heads. Chair Yoshiyama stated that once the Board settles the process, they can get into the mission and values. As soon as Mr. Takahashi can get that in writing to the Board, they can digest it and discuss further. B) Develop rule changes to the Rules of the Civil Service Commission/Merit Appeals Board Ms. Noda distributed the proposed amendments. The Merit Appeals Board has five chapters under Merit Appeals Board, Title II, Chapter 100,101, 102,103, and 104. Last month they had started off talking about amending the meeting rule, Rule, 100-6, which is on the third page towards the bottom of the page. The liberal interpretation of the rule now is the Board can move it away from the third Tuesday of every month since the rule allows "or as a time and place as specified by the Board." The only substantive change is adding "such other day, time, or place." Since they were doing that change and they have to give a public notice in public newspapers of the proposed changes, as well as give the public an opportunity to give input whether written or attendance at a hearing, changes were made to change the old name, Civil Service Commission, to Merit Appeals Board, and any references to Commission to Board, any reference to Director of Personnel to Director of Human Resources. Those are all the other changes in this document. 4 AOM%k 0014A Another proposed change is Rule 100 -3, disqualification of a Board member for any contested case hearing where they either recuse themselves or there's a motion by one of the parties that a Board member has personal bias or position. The current rule says that if there's an affidavit filed by one of the parties saying a specific Board member has a personal interest or bias in one of the contested case hearings, that person should be recused and not participate. Rule 100 -1(c) says that the Board member may file a disqualifying certificate, which Ms. Noda changed to say "statement." Questions had come up in other boards or commissions as to what is a certificate. She believes changing certificate to "statement" should suffice. There's also other clerical editing for formatting, such as the proper numbers, letters, or capitalization that doesn't affect anything of substance. Also under Rule 100 -5, filing of documents, the rule says it should be written in ink or typed, plainly legible, on strong, durable paper, no larger than 8-1/2 X 14, which is the legal sized paper. Ms. Noda changed it to 8-1/2 X 11 because most people don't use 8 -1/2 X 14; and to file that, the paper would have to be folded up for every single page. Mr. Silva suggested that under Rule 100-6, meetings, after the word shall, perhaps add the word "traditionally" or "normally," if that would help what they're trying to establish. Mr. De Lima suggested changing the rule to read that the meetings shall be once a month on a day designated by the Chair if there is business, or something to that effect. Don't even specify the date, or the specific day of the week, because right now the rules say they have to have a meeting and they're not, so why don't they just say it's subject to the call of the Chair if they have business. Ms. Noda stated that they could add that in as a modifying clause at the end. If there is a specific date generally set, that makes it easier on the Board's staff. Otherwise it's at the pleasure of the Board, which may raise questions and potential complaints if the public doesn't know the date of the meeting because there is no specific day and time set. Chair Yoshiyama recalled that at the last meeting, the Board decided they would meet at 9:30 a.m., the third Wednesday of every month. That was set by 5 /"Ak Aaftlk motion, not by rule, because the rule gives the Board that option. Now they're amending the rule, and the rule can be broad like Mr. De Lima suggested. Mr. De Lima stated that they should make the rule broad and make a motion on the meeting date. The sunshine law is the public's protection. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved that the Board's regular meetings be at a date, time, and place as specified by the Board. The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. Ms. Noda noted that the next step is to put the summary of the rule changes in the notice to the public so the public has the opportunity to comment. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved to consider proposed amendments to Title H, Rules of the Civil Service Commission/Merit Appeals Board of the Rules of the Department of Civil Service, County of Hawaii, Chapter 100 to Chapter 104, as discussed. The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. Ms. Noda stated that the notice to the public needs to be published in the newspapers with a summary of the changes (changing Civil Service Commission to Merit Appeals Board, changing director of personnel to director of human resources, etc.). The entire copy will be available to the public by either coming to the office in person and asking to see it or requesting that a copy be mailed if they pay for it. They can also come to the public hearing to submit their views orally or in writing, or submit written statements to the Merit Appeals Board. Ms. Noda asked whether the Board would like to consider allowing submittals via email in addition to submitting views orally or in writing, or submitting written statements via postal mail or hand - delivery. Mr. Silva expressed a concern with flooding staff with emails. The Board agreed with Ms. Noda's subsequent suggestion of adding fax submittals as another consideration. Timeline wise for the public hearing, Ms. Noda thought scheduling the public hearing for the Board's September meeting should meet the notice requirement, as they have to give the public 30 days or more of notice. She also recommended that the notice be published in the Sunday newspapers in both the Tribune Herald and West Hawaii Today. 0 Aowkk A01% As a courtesy, because of the island's large geographic size, public hearings are normally held in both Hilo and Kona. An option that she could look into if the Board chooses is to do videoconference meetings that allow both audio and visual. If the visual goes out, the meeting can be continued by audio only, as long as all the materials and everything else is accessible and available to everybody. The other consideration is, for instance, if Mr. Silva is in Kona and they have a quorum of three, if the videoconferencing (i.e., electricity) goes out and he's no longer accessible, then there's no longer a quorum to continue. Chair Yoshiyama asked whether they need a quorum to receive input from the public. He noted that it's not a debate or an exchange of ideas; it may be an explanation as to what the amendments are, but the public hearing is to receive information. Ms. Noda stated that she would check into that. Mr. Takahashi noted that previous practice on rules changes when they held public hearings was the director and secretary would open and conduct the public hearing. He doesn't believe they need to have that quorum. Chair Yoshiyama asked Mr. Takahashi about rule changes for the director. Mr. Takahashi noted that they are working on that, and there will be substantive changes to it, one of which will be to clarify the issue of filing appeals to the Board for probationary appointments. The Board scheduled the public hearing for 9:00 a.m., September 21, 2011 and decided to have only one public hearing in Hilo. DIRECTOR'S REPORT Mr. Takahashi reported the following: A) The County of Hawaii has negotiated a supplemental agreement with HGEA where they will have one -day furloughs beginning this Friday and thereafter the first Friday of every month for the next two fiscal years. The Mayor also negotiated a supplemental agreement to keep the EUTF contributions at 60/40 instead of 50150. Other unions are still in negotiations. 7 /-N '"\ Mr. Takahashi further explained that these supplemental agreements are in lieu of the 5% pay cut, the six hours supplemental time off, and the 50/50 EUTF. The EUTF difference between paying 50/50 and 60/40 for HGEA bargaining units is $750,000. The wages went from 5% across the board to 4.615 %, because the one - day -a -month furlough deduction comes out to a 4.615% reduction in pay. The County did budget for no reduction and maintaining the 60/40; and the County is realizing the furlough savings that was not budgeted. B) Implementation of online recruitment. The e- recruitment system went online July 18. Ms. Toriano reported, as a benchmark to measure, that there were 4,095 people that accessed the website since July 18. They're tracking that by each recruitment announcement, of which currently there are seven. She will have another count once the closing date passes and they count the actual number of applications. They are implementing the system in phases; this is part 1, phase 1. C) Items of current interest. The department's Personnel Organizational Development Specialist Suzanni Hopp has resigned from her position effective tomorrow. Mr. Takahashi will have to assess what they'll do with that position. NEXT MEETING DATE The Board scheduled its next meeting for Wednesday, August 17, 2011, at 9:30 a.m. AA"II-I -*w#IN The meeting adjourned at 10:19 a.m. Respectfully submitted, Ronald K. Takahashi Secretary APPROVED: AN n. Gary N. oshiya a Chair vym Hilo, Hawaii Wednesday, July 27, 2011 The regular meeting of the Merit Appeals Board, County of Hawaii, was held in the conference room of the Department of Human Resources, 101 Pauahi Street, Suite 2, Hilo, Hawaii, on Wednesday, July 27, 2011. Present: Mr. Gary Yoshiyama, Chair Mr. Kenneth Rowe, Vice Chair Mr. Henry "Hank" Silva, Member Mr. Brian De Lima, Member Mr. Ronald K. Takahashi, Director of Human Resources Ms. Diane Noda, Deputy Corporation Counsel Ms. Yumi Nakamura, Clerk III Ms. Velma Y. Menezes, Secretary-Reporter Chair Yoshiyama called the meeting to order at 9:30 a.m. ADDENDUM TO AGENDA Ms. Noda noted that at the Board's meeting last month, they had discussed amending Rule 100-6, meetings. However, today's agenda inadvertently refers to Rule 100-11, performance evaluation. According to HRS 92-7, the Board can amend the agenda with a two-thirds recorded vote only if the item to be added to the agenda is not of reasonable major importance and action thereon would not affect a significant number of persons. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved to amend the agenda to change item B under New Business to "develop rule changes to the Rules of the Civil Service Commission/Merit Appeals Board, Title IL" The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. Hawaii County is an EqualOpportunity Provider and Employer. MINUTES OF JUNE 23, 2011 Ms. Noda asked that the minutes be amended on page 6, paragraph 1, regarding their discussion on Rule 100-6, to reflect "a liberal interpretation is that the Board can change the meeting dav" and delete the last sentence of the paragraph. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved that the minutes of June 23, 2011 be approved as amended. The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. UNFINISHED BUSINESS A) Finalize draft letter for annual evaluation of Director of Human Resources for calendar year 2010 Chair Yoshiyama noted that the letter is for the fiscal year and not calendar year. There were two drafts of the letter available for discussion. Draft 1 has more detail, while Draft 2 is more general. When asked, Mr. Takahashi stated that he prefers Draft 2, although he has no problem with either one. Chair Yoshiyama added that the minutes of their June 23 meeting reflect the numerous comments on the evaluation by the Board members, the Mayor, and the Managing Director. MOTION: Mr. Silva moved to use Draft 2 as the final evaluation letter. The motion was seconded by Mr. De Lima and unanimously carried. NEW BUSINESS A) Formulate procedures for annual evaluations of the Director of Human Resources 2 Ms. Toriano recalled that the task presented at the last meeting was to collect evaluation forms that were being used by different groups. The packet before the Board has a total of five. Her perception from the last discussion was that one of the challenges they faced was obtaining feedback that could be used to complete the evaluation. With that being said, the first form, the Hawaii County Merit Appeals Board Evaluation Questionnaire, was the last document used at the time Mike Ben was being evaluated; and it was designed to obtain feedback from user groups. The user group consists of primarily the Mayor and the departments. Ms. Toriano is not comfortable in saying is that they deal a lot with the public. In HR, they tend to deal more internally as a service department. Other documents included the Chief of Police, Fire Chief, Hawaii Health Systems Corporation, and the Kauai jurisdiction evaluation forms. Criteria common in all of these documents include areas such as fiscal, ability to plan and organize, responsiveness to the users. Of course, for Police and Fire there is that public element that they're evaluating. Mr. Silva stated that the tool he found most productive, although they all would have to be modified, is the Chief of Police's evaluation, which is shorter and to the point. A couple of elements can be pulled out, but he's looking along the lines of criteria 10. He also suggested perhaps putting a notice in the paper to solicit comments about the evaluation and include a deadline for submitting comments. The Board might also want to designate one of the members to put something together as a starting point and everybody can take it apart after that. Mr. De Lima recalled that at the last meeting, he referred to the State's form that they use for their top administrators, one of them who was the former EUTF administrator who now serves on the Board of Education. He will look through his materials and share with the Board that evaluation form. He thinks the State's form allows for a more constructive process, because what it does is forces the administrator to first come up with specific objectives that are proposed to the Board for the upcoming year. They all agree on the assigned value of each of the objectives, then based upon the agreed-upon objectives at the beginning of the year, the administrator is evaluated. This process is not too far apart from what Mr. Silva was saying, and it forces an articulation and then acceptance. 3 Mr. Silva agreed with Mr. De Lima's comments, noting that that philosophy is more for the Board's type of management. They're not here every day, seeing everything, so that criteria are easier to judge; and of course there will be other measures too. Chair Yoshiyama noted that the other element to the above evaluation is the self-critique. He also stated that Kauai's came closest to what he was looking for. He asked Mr. Takahashi whether he had a strategic plan with vision and mission statements, goals, actions, etc. If Mr. Takahashi has that, it would serve as a basis. Mr. Takahashi responded that he does have a strategic plan and has periodical discussions with the division heads. Chair Yoshiyama stated that once the Board settles the process, they can get into the mission and values. As soon as Mr. Takahashi can get that in writing to the Board, they can digest it and discuss further. B) Develop rule changes to the Rules of the Civil Service Commission/Merit Appeals Board Ms. Noda distributed the proposed amendments. The Merit Appeals Board has five chapters under Merit Appeals Board, Title II, Chapter 100, 101, 102, 103, and 104. Last month they had started off talking about amending the meeting rule, Rule, 100-6, which is on the third page towards the bottom of the page. The liberal interpretation of the rule now is the Board can move it away from the third Tuesday of every month since the rule allows "or as a time and place as specified by the Board." The only substantive change is adding "such other day, time, or place." Since they were doing that change and they have to give a public notice in public newspapers of the proposed changes, as well as give the public an opportunity to give input whether written or attendance at a hearing, changes were made to change the old name, Civil Service Commission, to Merit Appeals Board, and any references to Commission to Board, any reference to Director of Personnel to Director of Human Resources. Those are all the other changes in this document. 4 Another proposed change is Rule 100-3, disqualification of a Board member for any contested case hearing where they either recuse themselves or there's a motion by one of the parties that a Board member has personal bias or position. The current rule says that if there's an affidavit filed by one of the parties saying a specific Board member has a personal interest or bias in one of the contested case hearings, that person should be recused and not participate. Rule 100-1(c) says that the Board member may file a disqualifying certificate, which Ms. Noda changed to say "statement." Questions had come up in other boards or commissions as to what is a certificate. She believes changing certificate to "statement" should suffice. There's also other clerical editing for formatting, such as the proper numbers, letters, or capitalization that doesn't affect anything of substance. Also under Rule 100-5, filing of documents, the rule says it should be written in ink or typed, plainly legible, on strong, durable paper, no larger than 8-1/2 X 14, which is the legal sized paper. Ms. Noda changed it to 8-1/2 X 11 because most people don't use 8-1/2 X 14; and to file that, the paper would have to be folded up for every single page. Mr. Silva suggested that under Rule 100-6, meetings, after the word shall, perhaps add the word "traditionally" or "normally," if that would help what they're trying to establish. Mr. De Lima suggested changing the rule to read that the meetings shall be once a month on a day designated by the Chair if there is business, or something to that effect. Don't even specify the date, or the specific day of the week, because right now the rules say they have to have a meeting and they're not, so why don't they just say it's subject to the call of the Chair if they have business. Ms. Noda stated that they could add that in as a modifying clause at the end. If there is a specific date generally set, that makes it easier on the Board's staff. Otherwise it's at the pleasure of the Board, which may raise questions and potential complaints if the public doesn't know the date of the meeting because there is no specific day and time set. Chair Yoshiyama recalled that at the last meeting, the Board decided they would meet at 9:30 a.m., the third Wednesday of every month. That was set by 5 motion, not by rule, because the rule gives the Board that option. Now they're amending the rule, and the rule can be broad like Mr. De Lima suggested. Mr. De Lima stated that they should make the rule broad and make a motion on the meeting date. The sunshine law is the public's protection. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved that the Board's regular meetings be at a date, time, and place as specified by the Board. The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. Ms. Noda noted that the next step is to put the summary of the rule changes in the notice to the public so the public has the opportunity to comment. MOTION: Mr. De Lima moved to consider proposed amendments to Title II, Rules of the Civil Service Commission/Merit Appeals Board of the Rules of the Department of Civil Service, County of Hawaii, Chapter 100 to Chapter 104, as discussed. The motion was seconded by Mr. Silva and unanimously carried. Ms. Noda stated that the notice to the public needs to be published in the newspapers with a summary of the changes (changing Civil Service Commission to Merit Appeals Board, changing director of personnel to director of human resources, etc.). The entire copy will be available to the public by either coming to the office in person and asking to see it or requesting that a copy be mailed if they pay for it. They can also come to the public hearing to submit their views orally or in writing, or submit written statements to the Merit Appeals Board. Ms. Noda asked whether the Board would like to consider allowing submittals via email in addition to submitting views orally or in writing, or submitting written statements via postal mail or hand-delivery. Mr. Silva expressed a concern with flooding staff with emails. The Board agreed with Ms. Noda's subsequent suggestion of adding fax submittals as another consideration. Timeline wise for the public hearing, Ms. Noda thought scheduling the public hearing for the Board's September meeting should meet the notice requirement, as they have to give the public 30 days or more of notice. She also recommended that the notice be published in the Sunday newspapers in both the Tribune Herald and West Hawaii Today. 6 As a courtesy, because of the island's large geographic size, public hearings are normally held in both Hilo and Kona. An option that she could look into if the Board chooses is to do videoconference meetings that allow both audio and visual. If the visual goes out, the meeting can be continued by audio only, as long as all the materials and everything else is accessible and available to everybody. The other consideration is, for instance, if Mr. Silva is in Kona and they have a quorum of three, if the video conferencing (i.e., electricity) goes out and he's no longer accessible, then there's no longer a quorum to continue. Chair Yoshiyama asked whether they need a quorum to receive input from the public. He noted that it's not a debate or an exchange of ideas; it may be an explanation as to what the amendments are, but the public hearing is to receive information. Ms. Noda stated that she would check into that. Mr. Takahashi noted that previous practice on rules changes when they held public hearings was the director and secretary would open and conduct the public hearing. He doesn't believe they need to have that quorum. Chair Yoshiyama asked Mr. Takahashi about rule changes for the director. Mr. Takahashi noted that they are working on that, and there will be substantive changes to it, one of which will be to clarify the issue of filing appeals to the Board for probationary appointments. The Board scheduled the public hearing for 9:00 a.m., September 21, 2011 and decided to have only one public hearing in Hilo. DIRECTOR'S REPORT Mr. Takahashi reported the following: A) The County of Hawaii has negotiated a supplemental agreement with HGEA where they will have one-day furloughs beginning this Friday and thereafter the first Friday of every month for the next two fiscal years. The Mayor also negotiated a supplemental agreement to keep the EUTF contributions at 60/40 instead of 50150. Other unions are still in negotiations. 7 Mr. Takahashi further explained that these supplemental agreements are in lieu of the 5% pay cut, the six hours supplemental time off, and the 50150 EUTF. The EUTF difference between paying 50150 and 60/40 for HGEA bargaining units is $750,000. The wages went from 5% across the board to 4.615%, because the one-day-a-month furlough deduction comes out to a 4.615% reduction in pay. The County did budget for no reduction and maintaining the 60/40; and the County is realizing the furlough savings that was not budgeted. B) Implementation of online recruitment. The e-recruitment system went online July 18. Ms. Toriano reported, as a benchmark to measure, that there were 4,095 people that accessed the website since July 18. They're tracking that by each recruitment announcement, of which currently there are seven. She will have another count once the closing date passes and they count the actual number of applications. They are implementing the system in phases; this is part 1, phase 1. C) Items of current interest. The department's Personnel Organizational Development Specialist Suzanni Hopp has resigned from her position effective tomorrow. Mr. Takahashi will have to assess what they'll do with that position. NEXT MEETING DATE The Board scheduled its next meeting for Wednesday, August 17, 2011, at 9:30 a.m. 8 The meeting adjourned at 10:19 a.m. Respectfully submitted, Ronald K. Takahashi Secretary APPROVED: Gary N. Yoshiyama Chair vym 9