Full-time position would be reduced to 28 hours per week

BY KEVIN BONESKE

REPORTER/PHOTOGRAPHER

A week into her first four-year term as Oneida County clerk, Tracy Hartman is seeking to make good on a campaign promise to reduce one of the deputy clerk positions in the office to part time.

At Monday’s joint Administration Committee/Labor Relations and Employee Services Committee meeting, committee members favored a request by Hartman to advertise for a three-quarters-time deputy clerk/elections specialist, though the position would still be in the 2017 budget as a full-time position.

“We don’t need three people in that (county clerk’s) office with the third person being there 37 ½ hours a week,” Hartman said.

The county clerk’s office, which is authorized three full-time positions in the budget, began the new year with 100 percent staff turnover.

Hartman replaced former county clerk Mary Bartelt, who decided not to seek re-election. Heidi Nehls, who was an economic support specialist in the county social services department, was appointed by Hartman as the new chief deputy clerk to replace Melodie Gauthier, who retired last month. The deputy clerk/election specialist position is now vacant after Kerri Ison left the county clerk’s office to begin an account technician position with the county public health department.

Upon hiring a new deputy clerk/election specialist for 28 hours a week, Hartman said the position could be re-evaluated with the possibility it could return to a full-time.

“(If) any board members are seeing areas that we’re not getting the service we need, we have it in the budget to increase that position back to a full-time (job),” she said.

Based on the fiscal impact statement, changing the deputy clerk/election specialist position from full-time to three-quarters-time would have an annual savings of $7,444 in wages at the “Step 1” level and $8,507 at the “Step 6” level, not including benefits.

Hartman, who is also the Crescent town clerk, said reducing the hours for the deputy clerk/election specialist position is not intended to place extra duties on the town clerks.

“That was not part of the plan,’ she said. “I believe that with the staff that we have we will be able to provide those services just fine at the 28 hours a week.”

Committee members favored hiring a deputy clerk/election specialist for 28 hours a week while also reviewing the efficiency of having a three-quarters-time employee after six months.