posted July 25 – San Juan County Health and Community Services Director Mark Tompkins finished up his five months as interim county manager by abruptly eliminating five county planning positions in the Department of Community Development, an action which is likely to prove costly for county taxpayers.
On July 9, 2024 the county administration notified the union of the elimination of the five union positions. The five employees were informed that afternoon. In an interview Friday, July 19, Tompkins said as county manager he had the authority to take such an action.
Asked if he had gone through the necessary procedures with the union, he said, “Yes, The collective bargaining agreement has a process and we followed that.”
According to the union, the county did not follow the procedures.
The county has hired outside counsel to handle the problems created by ending five union jobs and contracting out the work. The Union has filed a grievance and a demand to bargain. The next meeting between the outside counsel and the Union is set for Friday, July 26.
The rationale for implementing the multi-step plan – that includes cleaning up the code, hiring a permit technician, another code enforcement officer, and contracting out the work done by the former land use planners – is that the county is obligated to review permits in a timely manner. The state is changing what it considers timely as of January 1, 2025.
Tompkins said the county has struggled with processing permits in a timely fashion for years. He said, “We weren’t able to meet our obligations.”
Numerous tweaks to the process have been tried over the years. Currently the county contracts out review of building plans and critical area reports to two outside firms. Tompkins said that unfortunately that hasn’t sped up the planning process.
Described as one of the steps in a multi-step plan to speed up processing of land use permits, the county will contract another outside firm to do part of the processing of the land use permits. Asked how that will speed things up since the same steps will be done by the contractors as were done by the county employees, Tompkins said the contracted firm can provide more staff and also won’t be dealing with phone calls from applicants.
Asked to describe the new process, Tompkins said, “We’re still working through that, haven’t firmed it up yet.” The county has contracted with a company to do the work.
Tompkins said the process includes these steps:
Applicants will submit their applications through the portal.
The permit technician (a new position to be filled) will receipt in applications and do a completeness check and be the point of contact for the applicants.
The county will provide the contracting firm access to Smart Gov so they can see the online submittals and review them based on our code. Then let us know if it is in compliance or not.
Asked how that speeds anything up, Tompkins said, the contractor has “access to more individuals. They can focus on the reviews instead of having the phone calls and all of that.”
He noted that the plan includes a three-month review. “We’ll see if we have to adjust.”
Asked about the timing of the action with the new county manager starting on July 11, Tompkins said it was just a coincidence.
According to Tompkins, it is also a coincidence that the five people who lost their jobs were concerned about irregularities in the planning process. Is the proposed cement batching plant receiving special treatment
MORE INFORMATION
Planners replaced with outside firm (Posted July 9, 2024)