Amador County – The Amador County Board of Supervisors will consider laying off 17 county employees at a special meeting Tuesday as bargaining units failed to approve 36-hour furlough work weeks.
Amador County Administrative Officer Chuck Iley announced the pending decision Friday, saying the “cuts come after several years of declining revenues, accompanied by persistent increases in the costs of employee benefits.”
He said: “Recent contract agreements with the various bargaining units have increased the contributions by employees to their retirement packages, but those additional contributions have not offset the recent pension contribution increases that the County has experienced. The pension contributions by the County will be even higher next fiscal year. Property taxes have also declined another 3.88 percent this year, and the County also faces the loss of approximately $1.2 million in vehicle license fee funds.”
Iley said “with all of these impacts, the General Fund is down 9 percent from last fiscal year. Until now, the shortened workweek and employee concessions have allowed the County to avoid significant layoffs this deep into the recession.”
He said the County has “been unable to reach agreement with most of the represented bargaining units for an extension of the 36 hour workweek, thus necessitating the Board’s consideration of layoffs.
The 17 positions to be considered in the “General Unit workforce reduction,” to be considered at Tuesday’s meeting, include two Animal Control officers; a finance assistant in the Auditing department; and a coordinator and counselor in Behavioral Health. One Animal Control Officer 2 will be requested for extension through Oct. 19. The other is an “extra help” level 1 officer.
Other positions to be considered for layoffs are a Building inspector; a Code officer; a Cooperative Extension secretary; a GIS coordinator in Information technology; and two assistant civil engineers in Public Works. Also three employees each may be laid off in Environmental Health (an assistant, a specialist and a technician); and three in the Facilities Department, including a maintenance worker, a construction worker and a custodian.
Iley said: “Employees who are laid off will be given three weeks’ pay. In addition, they will be placed on recall lists in case the budget situation improves and positions are filled.” The special meeting is 1 p.m. Tuesday. A closed session is scheduled for 12:30 p.m. and includes a conference with labor negotiators.
Story by Jim Reece This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
