Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Personnel Policy topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Klamath County board vets admin‑leave, whistleblower policy changes; asks counsel to review and schedules training
Summary
Board members discussed revisions to the county’s administrative‑leave and whistleblower policies, asked legal counsel to review 'good faith' threshold language, and directed HR to schedule employee training; no policy change was adopted at the meeting.
Klamath County commissioners spent a portion of their April 14 administrative meeting reviewing proposed edits to the county’s administrative leave and whistleblower policies and directed staff to secure legal review and employee training before final adoption.
Staff described edits to the administrative leave policy that shorten and reorganize language, and outlined a 30/60/90‑day notification and review timeline involving HR and legal counsel. Commissioners asked for time to read the revised text and agreed that, absent substantial feedback within roughly a week, staff should move the item into the blue‑sheet process for formal consideration.
On the whistleblower policy, board members flagged a procedural concern: the county’s prior language was taken directly from Oregon statute, and some commissioners preferred retaining statute‑based phrasing rather than replacing it with a shorter draft. The board discussed defining a "good faith" reporting threshold to distinguish ordinary workplace complaints from statutory whistleblower reports and asked legal counsel to re‑review the draft to ensure it aligns with statutory requirements.
Commissioners also requested that HR schedule a refresher training for employees clarifying what constitutes protected whistleblower reporting versus ordinary supervisory complaints. No vote or formal adoption occurred; the board directed staff to return with counsel’s advice and to revisit the policy in a legal/HR meeting scheduled in approximately two weeks.
