Miss Tapia presented the personnel board with a one-month managers report on Oct. 30, saying the county is continuing work on its compensation policy, is recruiting for three senior positions and is preparing for employee open enrollment and a health fair.

"We continue to work on the compensation policy," Miss Tapia told the board, saying the county has been bringing stakeholders in for feedback and expects to finalize changes in the next month or so. She said the county is recruiting, with help from MGT Impact Solutions, for three leadership roles: fire chief (following Troy Hughes retirement), Miss Tapias own position (she said she plans to retire) and a public information officer (following Julie Williams Hills retirement). Updates on those recruitments will be provided at future meetings, she said.

Miss Tapia described work to replace an end-of-life evaluation system by building a new performance-evaluation workflow inside the countys Munis platform and said job descriptions are being reviewed on a four-year cycle and revised when duties have changed. She said a market study is planned for fiscal year 2028 and that the county will issue a request for proposals as part of next years budget work.

On safety and training, staff reported training-compliance rates of 90% or higher. Miss Tapia said the county is rolling out a revised respirator program with questionnaires, equipment training and revised forms, and that additional courses are being added. The county manager has asked that every employee complete customer-service training; staff are coordinating with Santa Fe Community College and University of New Mexico-Los Alamos for trainers.

Miss Tapia said the benefits team attended the NEDA conference to review implementation strategies for retirement and deferred-compensation accounts. Open enrollment will begin with a health fair in Council Chambers on Nov. 5 and conclude Dec. 12. She told the board the county recommends splitting anticipated premium increases so the county pays half and employees pay half; Miss Tapia described the anticipated increase as "just over 5%" for employees and the county and noted a 13.4% figure that was discussed for a retiree/contract category.

She also reviewed service awards and listed several upcoming retirements. The report closed with introductions of key personnel: Bernadette Martinez (deputy HR manager), Victoria De Vargas (risk manager) and Matt (HR analyst).