Houston County approves donated-sick-leave option, debates holiday pay and raises

Houston County officials voted to add a donated-sick-leave option to the county personnel policy and spent the meeting reviewing holiday-pay rules, bereavement language and how state salary increases should apply to county-funded positions.

The board approved, by voice vote, a motion "to add the ability for an employee to donate ... sick leave to a fellow employee with long-term illnesses," a participant moved and another seconded; the motion passed without recorded roll-call counts. "I'll make it as a motion that we add the ability for an employee to donate ... sick leave to a fellow employee," the mover said in proposing the change.

Why it matters: the donated-leave policy creates a local mechanism for employees to share accrued leave when a colleague faces catastrophic illness; officials said the change fills a gap because the county lacks the state'style leave-pool system that allows donations across employees.

Holiday pay and scheduling: participants said the current practice gives full-time employees double pay when they work a holiday because full-time workers also receive holiday pay if they are off that day; part-time employees generally do not receive holiday pay unless they are scheduled to work. A staff speaker summarized federal practice: "If you have an employee that is working that is required to work on holiday, they get double pay," and participants discussed whether the county policy should adopt similar language or simply specify which operations (for example, the convenience center) have different holiday lists or pay treatment.

Officials agreed Juneteenth needs to be added to the listed holidays and noted specific operational exceptions: the convenience center works the Friday after Thanksgiving and certain other sites work New Year's Eve (some employees work until 1 a.m.), so the policy should explicitly list which offices are treated differently.

Bereavement and leave detail: the group reviewed bereavement provisions that currently read as unpaid in the manual and said the bereavement section should be rewritten to provide paid days (participants referenced moving toward three paid days and allowing use of vacation or comp time where appropriate). The body also discussed adding language to allow employees to donate accrued leave to another employee, and agreed to insert that provision under the vacations/leave section.

Pay raises and classification: officials debated whether county-funded staff who receive state pay increases (referred to in the meeting as "UT" or contract-funded positions) should be treated as county employees for raises, or as contract employees whose raises are handled differently. One participant asked, "are we county employees? Are we contract employees?" and officials acknowledged the issue "is a very confusing situation" that affects budgeting and equity across county staff. No final decision was reached; participants agreed to draft clearer language and to consult a reviewer before bringing the full package back for adoption.

Next steps: staff were asked to draft the clarified policy language, add the donated-leave provision and the updated holiday list (including Juneteenth), and circulate the draft for review (a reviewer named Charles was asked to sign off). Participants proposed reconvening in about 30 days and scheduling a presentation to the full body in mid-April to finalize adoption.

The meeting record shows the body approved the donated-leave motion by voice; other policy changes were directed to staff for redrafting and return to the board for final action.