BY ANDY TAYLOR
INDEPENDENCE — A decision to establish a secretarial position for the Montgomery County Commission was put on hold Monday after the commission chairman voted against his own motion to create that job.
Commission chairman Tony Fowler appeared ready to establish the job of commission secretary, whose jobs would include, he said, handling daily correspondence and communication with the commission chairman as well as preparing the meeting agenda and commissioners’ information packets. The secretarial position would not require an additional employee but use an existing courthouse secretary to handle the extra duties of being the commission chairman, Fowler said.
Fowler presented a motion to establish the secretarial position, and the motion received a “second” from commissioner Fred Brown.
However, prior to voting on the motion, commissioner Larry McManus raised concerns about the job, specifically the amount of compensation, or extra compensation, that would be available to whomever holds that position.
“I’m kind of hung up on this,” said McManus. “Without more discussion on it, I would have to say ‘no’.”
That’s when Fowler did an about-face and then also voted “no” on the motion, thus putting Brown in a position to also cast a negative vote on the proposal.
Fowler said he understood and appreciated McManus’ concerns. Fowler said he would favor having Shawn Wallis, the county’s human resources director, research the ramifications of salary compensation before the commission discusses it again at its July 13 meeting.
At the commission’s June 29 meeting, Fowler emphasized that he did not anticipate any additional costs being shouldered by county taxpayers with the establishment of a commission secretary. That’s why he favored taking an existing employee (in this case, the secretary to the emergency preparedness director) and adding the commission chairman’s correspondence and communication duties to that job.
However, at Monday’s meeting, Fowler suggested that some sort of extra compensation should be offered. He suggested that $100 in additional income be provided to the commission secretary for handling the extra duties.
That suggestion brought an objection from county clerk Charlotte Scott-Schmidt, whose deputies and secretaries currently handle the bulk of the commission’s affairs, such as handling communication with constituents and the preparation of meeting agendas and information packets.
Having another person being paid a higher wage for work currently handled by her own staff would be unfair to those existing county clerk employees, Scott-Schmidt said.
Scott-Schmidt also said she had concerns whether the commission secretary’s position would be posted and available to other courthouse employees.
When asked by a member of the press to detail what the commission secretary would specifically do, Fowler responded that the person would handle the bulk of the chairman’s correspondence and communication and would be present at all meetings to assist the commission chairman.
However, Scott-Schmidt said all records, documents and meeting minutes would continue to be handled by a member of the county clerk herself or a delegate from her staff pursuant to state law.
“In the times when we did have a commission secretary, the secretary did not attend the meetings,” Scott-Schmidt told Fowler.
The commission secretarial position was dissolved in 1997 when the county commission at that time opted for laptop computers and cellular telephones as a way for handling their own communication and correspondence. Commissioners are still allowed cell phones but have chosen in recent years to not use laptop computers.
While Fowler voted against his own motion to establish the commission secretarial position, he was emphatic that the job would not require additional costs to the taxpayers.
“Right now, we have secretaries in the courthouse who are already handling those duties,” he said. “So, we’re already paying for it. This is just a different way of doing it.”
