Personnel Board

City and Borough of Juneau Personnel Board Thursday, May 21, 2020, 12:00 p.m. Via Zoom Webinar MINUTES I. Call to Order The meeting of the Personnel Board held virtually via Zoom webinar was called to order by Acting Chair Judith Porter at 12:05 p.m. Board Members Present: Judith Porter, Cindy Spanyers, Nancy Sutch, Rodney Hesson, and Ken Southerland (Ken was stuck in attendee mode for most of the meeting.) Members absent: None. Staff Present: Human Resources/Risk Management (HRRM) Director Dallas Hargrave, and Municipal Clerk Beth McEwen II. Approval of Minutes November 26, 2019 Personnel Board Meeting Minutes MOTION, by Ms. Spanyers, to approve the minutes with a small correction to the top of page 1 to reflect the year 2019 and asked for unanimous consent. Hearing no objection, it was so ordered. III. Roles and Responsibilities of the Personnel Board HRRM Director Hargrave provided an overview of the scope, role, and duties of the board as we out in Ordinance 94-12 and CBJ Code Section 44.05. He noted that copies of all the materials were provided to the members in their binders and that the most recent updates to the Personnel Rules, which may be amended from time to time by the Assembly, could always be found on the CBJ website at https://juneau.org/human- resources/personnel-rules. Mr. Hargrave noted that in the four and half years that he has been in his position and staff to the Personnel Board, they have not had to apply any of the duties of the board. He and Ms. Porter noted that if/when they may have to step into a matter covered under 44.05 that the CBJ Law Department would provide point in time training on those matters specifically to the board. Mr. Hargrave noted that the Personnel Plan and the Labor Relations Plan are two different sections of the CBJ Code. The Personnel Plan addresses more of the details of the board are and are found in CBJ Code 44.05.060. The Labor Relations Plan is in 44.10 and covers more of how the labor relations are set up for CBJ. Lastly, Mr. Hargrave Personnel Board Annual Meeting May 21, 2020 Page 1 of 4 noted that the Personnel Board has its own Rules of Procedure that were also provided in the board’s binders. Mr. Hargrave said he does not foresee any issues coming up soon on the CBJ front that may end up back before the Personnel Board. Ms. Porter said in listening to the news and the economic situations unfolding if they saw any of that having an impact on labor negotiations. Mr. Hargrave noted that the Assembly Finance Committee (AFC) has been holding its weekly budget meetings. He noted that two weeks prior, during an AFC meeting, Deputy Manager Mila Cosgrove had provided a good overview of laying out the pros and cons for the different strategies the Assembly could use on cost saving measures. He said that where there are bargaining obligations, if they would like to make a change to bargaining agreements. He said those are the discussions taking place in a public setting. He also noted that there are currently negotiations going on with some of the unions and nothing has changed yet with the current collective bargaining agreements. Mr. Hargrave He said there is a specific portion of the workforce that is not represented. He noted that the Assembly does have some leeway with making changes to the Personnel Rules and while we don’t have any provisions in the collective bargaining agreements related to furlough, we do have them in the Personnel Rules for the non- bargaining employees. He said that in the next few years, if the Assembly directs the City Manager to implement provisions for non-bargaining employees that are different from bargaining employees that may trigger some activity before the Personnel Board. He also noted that they has not been the City Manager nor the Assembly’s approach to things in recent years. It may just depend on what the fiscal landscape looks like in the future and where the Assembly wants to go with that. IV. Annual Report for 2020 Mr. Hargrave and Ms. McEwen provided a proposed draft report to the board. Ms. McEwen noted that the annual report is generally provided to the Assembly Human Resources Committee at the time of the annual board appointments, which in the case of the Personnel Board is in December or January of each year. Mr. Hargrave suggested that unless there was something of significant change between now and December, he could work with the Chair the Clerk to finalize the report for submission to the Assembly in December. If there were cause to hold additional meetings between now and December, the board could make changes to the annual report during those meetings. That recommendation was approved by unanimous consent. V. Election of Chair / Vice-Chair Ms. Porter asked if anyone was not interested in serving as Chair or Vice-Chair before she opened it up to nominations for the two positions. Ms. Spanyers said she was not interested in serving as an officer. Ms. Porter then went through the membership roster and the term ending dates for each of the current members. Ms. Porter that she will be coming up at the end of the year for the end of her term and that she will be meeting her Personnel Board Annual Meeting May 21, 2020 Page 2 of 4 term limits. Ms. McEwen explained the code provisions does permit the Assembly to reappoint a current member if they are at their term limit provided no other applicants apply. Ms. Porter said she’d be happy to step down at the end of term to allow for a new member to be appointed to that seat. She then opened the floor to nominations for the Chair and Vice-Chair seats. MOTION, by Ms. Porter to nominate Mr. Rodney Hesson as Chair of the Personnel Board. Hearing no objection, Mr. Hesson was elected Chair of the Personnel Board. MOTION, by Ms. Porter to nominate Ms. Nancy Sutch as Vice-Chair of the Personnel Board. Hearing no objection, Ms. Sutch was elected Vice-Chair of the Personnel Board. VI. Agenda Items and Schedule for Next Meeting Mr. Hargrave noted that he was trying to put together an informational item that had been provided in the past and that had to do with what percentage of the workforce was included in the bargaining units vs. those who are not. He said that he wasn’t able to pull all that information together for this meeting but rather than postponing that information to the next meeting, if the board was amenable, he would send it to the board via email as an informational item only. The board agreed that they would like it to be sent out via email once Mr. Hargrave had something available. The board discussed whether to try to schedule the next meeting sometime in December or February and it was agreed upon that they would tentatively schedule it for February 11, 2021 at Noon. Ms. Spanyers asked when the Bartlett Regional Hospital collective agreements would be coming up for negotiations. Mr. Hargrave responded that BRH collective bargaining agreement expires on December 31, 2020. He said that BRH has a history that have the pay increases take place at the switch of the fiscal year which is July 1 and then hold negotiations when the contract ends which will likely start in December. He said there is new union leadership there and he isn’t sure if that will be the same process they will chose to use going forward or not. Ms. Sutch asked who the new union leadership with BRH is. Mr. Hargrave said that there is an ER nurse who is the president, Holly Hunter. He said that some of the stewards are the same but they elected new leadership. Good of the order: Ms. Porter said that she had been stuck in California at the beginning of the pandemic and when she returned to Juneau, it was the strangest thing going through the Seattle airport in April as there was no one around except the few people who came off the flight she was on. She shared her experience about having gone through quarantine. Personnel Board Annual Meeting May 21, 2020 Page 3 of 4 Mr. Southerland, who had been stuck in attendee mode most of the meeting, said he would be interested in hearing what might be happening on the school district front in light of the pandemic. Mr. Hargrave gave a recap of some of the information that had been covered at the Assembly Finance Committee meetings in recent discussions. He noted that we are in some very uncertain times and there may be anything that comes up during the next few months. VII. Adjournment There being no further business to come before the Personnel Board, the meeting adjourned at 12:35 p.m. Respectfully Submitted, Elizabeth J. McEwen, MMC Municipal Clerk Personnel Board Annual Meeting May 21, 2020 Page 4 of 4