6-Point Plan (With input and counterproposals from IFPTE Local 17)

August 15, 2007

Our Six-Point Plan

The departments have developed the following set of recommendations to address the recruitment and retention issues of most concern. Some of these activities have been underway for some time, others require assistance from Human Resources and/or the Executive’s Office.

Ø We have been told that the County did not intend to limit the Six Point Plan to Civil Engineers. However, the language in this document refers exclusively to Civil Engineers. We propose to apply this to all classifications represented by Local 17, and hope this to be a common interest. We hope the County will change the language in the document to be inclusive.

1) Advancement Opportunities

One concern we have heard from engineers is that there are limited advancement opportunities within the County. This is understandable given a fairly young workforce and few upper level engineering positions. To address this issue, the departments are proposing the following actions:

a) Succession Planning – Prepare staff for upper level positions that will become available, especially in identified critical positions. This may include additional management training and/or formalized mentoring relationships.

Ø Questions/Comments: Is it Management’s intent to prepare staff for upper level Management positions here, or is this for succession planning at every level? Is it necessary to isolate the training to management training, or are there other types of training that we may want to include here? What sort of formalized mentoring did you have in mind? We are interested in making sure that whatever opportunities are created through this process, that they are available to all employees. How would you let people know about them?

b) Rotation Opportunities – Provide rotation opportunities to staff when positions first become available. Look for voluntary rotation opportunities when an engineer has been in the same position for more than 5 years. Rotations will provide engineers with experience in different areas of civil engineering that will increase job satisfaction and make advancement more probable.

Ø Questions/Comments: Employees in many of our classifications are interested in creating voluntary opportunities to switch places with each other for periods of time. We think a type of employee exchange program between Departments could be good for the County and our members. Is there a reason that we would need to limit this to employees who have been in a position for 5 years?

c) CEIT Program – The Civil Engineer in Training Program, a new program implemented this year, gives newly hired engineers or existing staff entering this program, job experience in different areas of civil engineering. The program also exposes managers to different engineers so that these engineers will have more network opportunities and mentoring relationships when higher level positions become available.

d) Special Assignments – Provide special and interesting engineering assignments when possible that are outside of the normal work for an engineer. These would be opportunities to work on unique projects that would increase job satisfaction for many engineers.

Ø Questions/Comments: We want to make sure that the employee has the right to return to the same position they left before taking the special assignment. We also want to make sure that people aren’t being assigned work outside of their classification. However, if there is a need for out-of-class work we want to ensure that the employee is compensated for it.

e) Leave and Return – It is important to note that advancement opportunities for an engineer may be with another government or private entity and that the person may return to the County in a higher level position. Attracting people back to the County may require the County change its sick leave policies (e.g., giving the re-hire a small sick leave balance) and vacation leave accrual (e.g., giving re-hire a higher accrual rate).

Ø Questions/Comments: Is this policy intended to address employees returning in promotional positions or people who were employed in any position with the County, left and then returned.

Ø We propose to allow these returning employees to be able to use sick leave and vacation during their probationary period.

Ø Is it the County’s interest to allow a returning employee to accrue vacation at the rate they accrued vacation when they left the County, or giving them a higher scale than current employees?

Ø What sort of sick leave balance does the County propose here? Is it your intent to return unused sick leave balances to returning employees, or giving them a balance that they did not have “on the books” when they left the County?

Ø We do see these subjects as mandatory subjects of bargaining.

2) Pay
To compete for engineers against other employers, and most importantly private consultants, it is important to be able to offer competitive compensation. Private consultants can offer bonuses and other forms of compensation that attract engineers. We recognize it is not likely we will match the private sector and matching them is probably not necessary since the County offers advantages the private sector does not. It is important however, to be competitive and to recognize that if we do not retain our engineers, we will be paying them what the private sector pays, since we will be paying these former employees who are now working on our projects as consultants. We propose the following actions in addition to the annual cost of living adjustment:

a) Step Adjustments – Adjust Civil Engineer 1 through 3 and Engineering Manager salaries up to be more competitive in the market.

b) Stretch Salary Range – Explore the possibility of stretching the top of the salary range for the Civil Engineer 1 through 3 and Engineering Managers to include a “Hot Skill Pay or Market Pay” to attract engineers into those positions that are most difficult to fill.

Ø Questions/Comments: We propose to help mitigate some of the crisis related to licensed Engineers and other employees leaving the County by paying for their expertise.

Ø We propose license/certification pay for employees with a PE, PLS, SR/WA (for Right-of-Way) or discipline specific (to be agreed upon by the Union and the County) pay at the rate of 5%.

Ø Employees with an EIT, LSIT or other comparable license or certification, as agreed upon by the Union and the County, will receive an additional 2.5%. When they obtain their PE or LSIT, etc., those employees will receive 5%.

Ø On the issue of “hot skill” or “market pay” we have all employees interested in a commitment from the County that when we have a recruitment or retention issue- or when we can prove that Pierce County’s wages are out of alignment with the market that the County will be receptive to sitting down and bargaining- or at least hearing their case. This whole area related to pay is a mandatory subject of bargaining is, again, one of those issues subject to agreement and an MOU.

Ø Longevity Pay: We propose to reinstate Pierce County’s longevity pay plan. The “leave and return” policy acknowledged the need to attract back to the County people who have left. We believe that we need to reward those employees who have made Pierce County their career. If retaining employees is a part of the goal, longevity pay is a part of the solution.

3) Recruitment
Steps have begun and can be expanded to go well beyond our normal recruitment methods in the County to attract engineers. The departments are proposing the following steps continue or begin:

a) College Recruitment – We are aggressively visiting colleges to recruit engineers during their senior year. We are conducting this outreach with assistance from Human Resources. One process that is being used now is to make offers on the spot for candidates rather than putting them through months of application and interview processes.

Ø Questions/Comments: TCC now offers a 4-year Civil Engineering Degree. Have you made contacts with them yet? By making on the spot offers, does that violate any internal hiring processes and set the County up for litigation?

b) CEIT Program – The Civil Engineer-in-Training Program described above is a very attractive option for some young engineers and we currently use this as a recruiting tool at colleges. We also use it to encourage our existing technical staff to pursue their engineering education and licensing.

c) Paid Summer Internships - We are also using our time at colleges to recruit summer interns in the engineering schools. Our hope is that students who work with us for a summer or two will want to work here after they graduate.

Ø Is there a difference between this program and the summer hire program? Is there a difference in the wage, if so what and why?

4) Growing Our Own
A number of talented and motivated engineering technicians in the County have expressed an interest in becoming engineers by completing additional education and/or passing the Engineer-In-Training examination. These staff members are likely to be even more dedicated to the County if we help them advance in their careers through additional education. The departments propose the following:

a) Tuition Reimbursement – Staff would be reimbursed for tuition costs for courses taken toward the completion of a civil engineering degree. This would carry with it a commitment to continue with County employment for some specified period.

Ø Questions/Comments: We like the concept of tuition reimbursement for employees pursuing degrees that can help with County lines of business. Is this intended to be solely for Engineering? We cannot expect a lifetime of service in exchange for an education benefit, but we understand the County’s interest in not wanting to invest in an employee who will only use the education to immediately seek outside employment with no repercussions. We view this as a mandatory subject of bargaining.

b) EIT and PE Exam - Staff would be reimbursed the expense of taking refresher courses for the State Engineer-in-Training and/or Professional Engineering exams.

Ø Questions/Comments: We would like to clarify that your intent is to help employees get reimbursed for taking classes related to their individual career tracks (not just Engineering) and that you would like to help defray the costs of fees associated with taking professional exams. If this is correct, we like the concept and, feel that this is a mandatory subject of bargaining and would need to clarify details in an MOU.

5) Schedule Flexibility
Some staff are interested in flexibility with their work schedules to work around family commitments and other life activities. While some flex schedules are now available such as working four 10 hour days per week, the departments are proposing the following:

a) Part-time Work – Staff would be allowed to work less than full-time schedules perhaps sharing a position’s duties.

b) Schedule Flexibility – Additional schedules would be allowed, such as 8-9s and an 8 with every other Friday off.

c) Rehiring Retired Employees – Employees who have retired will be brought back on an hourly basis and allowed to work as many hours as they would like, while complying with PERS retirement regulations.

Ø Questions/Comments: We’ve been proposing 9-8’s for years! We are so glad you’re on board! These areas are all mandatory subjects (yada, yada), but conceptually we have common interests. We have some concerns about the retire/rehire issue. Did you mean to say that we should be using them (allowing them to work as many hours as they would like) in lieu of hiring for positions that need to be filled? Or did you mean to distinguish that in the past PERS prohibited them from working more than a certain number of hours?

6) Refine Engineering Duties within Organization
The duties of “engineering” as defined in State law are generally clear, however, there is opportunity to focus the County’s engineering resources. This would allow engineers to perform more engineering activities and less administrative, planning, and technical functions. To accomplish this the departments propose the following:

a) Review Duties – Review the duties of engineers in selected portions of the departments to ensure that duties for different positions are focused appropriately on engineering verses technical work verses administrative work.

b) Backfill Resources - Create additional planning, technical, and administrative positions and hire additional staff to support engineering functions.

Ø Questions/Comments: If we have Engineers doing office support and Management has become aware of the problem and is interested in correcting this, we understand. We don’t want to see Engineering work get so specialized that we have Engineering lines churning out product mechanically. This could drive Engineers away that like the ability to be more diverse in the work they do.