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Committee approves reinstatement request for county executive-assistant position and forwards to full board
Summary
The committee voted to support reinstating an executive-assistant position in the county administrator’s office after a staffing analysis found the office needs roughly 2.12 FTE; funding for 2025 will be reallocated from other departments and 2026 funding is expected from projected revenue increases but not guaranteed.
Jackson County committee members voted to adopt staff’s recommendation to reinstate an executive-assistant position in the county administrator’s office and forwarded the item to the full board for final action.
Michael (county staff) told the committee the position was approved by the board from 2016 through February 2024 and became unfilled after the prior incumbent resigned. He said a two-week evaluation and an in-depth time study showed the administrator’s office requires about 2.12 full-time-equivalent positions to handle current workloads. Michael described specific workload pressures including FOIA processing, insurance claims and day-to-day administrative support.
Michael said the county can reallocate existing 2025 general-fund dollars from another department that experienced turnover to fund the position for the remainder of 2025. For the 2026 budget he said the county is “counting on or expecting” increases in marijuana-related state revenue based on three years of historical increases, but he did not quantify expected amounts. When commissioners asked whether the sheriff’s budget would be affected, Michael said the 2025 reallocation would not come from the sheriff’s budget and that the department he plans to draw from this year is unrelated to the sheriff.
Several commissioners expressed concern about relying on uncertain revenue for 2026 and about the operational risk of continuing with only one support staff in the administrator’s office. One commissioner said the existing employee had worked approximately 17 years and was doing overtime, and that leaving the position vacant had already produced service impacts, including slowed processing of insurance claims. County leadership said they considered temporary redistribution of tasks and evaluated whether responsibilities could move to other departments, but concluded the workload and risk of burnout made reinstatement necessary.
A motion to adopt staff’s recommendation passed in committee and will advance to the full board for final approval.
