Discussion and possible action to approve the re-posting and filling of the following Slot at the most recent pay rate of $23.97 received by the employee who last held the position, subject to the availability of payroll funds and any applicable Webb County employment guidelines, effective August 8, 2016 and any other matters incident thereto. [Note: This position was advertised for 5 days and there were 16 qualified applicants]
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Slot # |
Title |
Hourly Rate |
|
|
|
0547 |
Public Information Officer |
$23.97 16/V |
The Webb County Sheriff’s Office seeks to keep the current salary being paid to that slot at the $23.97 hourly rate because of the difficulty in finding qualified, experienced candidates at the original starting pay. As per the counsel of the Webb County Commissioners’ Court on June 27, 2016 and having used the lower pay rate, the Webb County Sheriff’s Office has already gone through the process of receiving/reviewing job applications and interviewing the limited number of potential candidates. However, the Webb County Sheriff’s Office seeks to re-post the position at the hourly rate of $23.97 in order to seek a sufficient pool of qualified candidates. This position is a critical position that should be paid at the last salary rate rather than what is recommended by the Condrey Plan due to the complexity/challenges in managing communications, media responsiveness, open records act requests, public relations, and covering seizures, arrests, and other law enforcement efforts by the Webb County Sheriff’s Office on a 24 hour/7 days-a-week basis. Furthermore, this slot is a highly sensitive and critical position which requires a high salary rate due to the complexity of the position's primary duties, high threshold of minimum job qualifications, the need to employ a job applicant who can start with significant expertise/experience, and the requirement that the PIO must respond to inquiries about law enforcement related incidents and provide media with correct and accurate but redacted information at any time of the day or week. Finally, this slot is classified as exempt by rule of the Civil Service Commission; and, thus, is excluded from Civil Service coverage and guidelines.
Issue: Need to fill critical position (Slot #0547) of Public Information Officer (PIO) at the existing rate of $23.97. This is due to the law enforcement sensitive information this position provides to media and public, especially due the importance, breadth, scope, volume, legally required timeliness, and sensitive nature of processing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Previous Public Information Officer resigned effective 6/03/2016.
Solution: Request is being made to fill slot #0547 at the current rate of $23.97 in order to continue to provide necessary and required public accountability, transparency, and public service information.
Result: The filling of this important position and slot at the current pay rate of $23.97 will allow the Webb County Sheriff’s Office to continue to meet important transparency/accountability duties and otherwise be responsive to needed/requested information by Webb County taxpayers, media personnel, special advocacy groups, and other community members. |