FIRING: For cause key for county

The County Commissioners are wrestling with the “at-will” or “for cause” policy which, at its core, is a debate over the process for firing a county employee. “At will” policy implies that an employee can be terminated “because I said so” while the “for cause” policy requires a reason. This debate is the result of wrongly bringing business thinking to government. Businesses, especially small businesses should be “at-will” because the ultimate responsibility for the business falls to the owner. If an employee is not performing it is the owner that suffers and therefore must have the right to terminate.

In county government, the employees are managed by the commissioners and department heads but the responsibility for their performance falls on the taxpayer. For example, the commissioners may have approved a termination payment but the funding came out of the taxpayers’ pockets. As a taxpayer, I want to know that the commissioners (who also work for the taxpayers) are not arbitrarily firing people, which was apparently what happened during the recent fiasco with the airport manager. I want to know that if an employee was terminated it was because they operated outside the parameters of their job and not because of a personality conflict with their manager.

Call it whatever you want, in the end every employee of the county should enjoy a clear understanding of their duties and responsibilities as well as an articulation of their expected performance; including performance levels that will allow them to remain at that position, make them a candidate for promotion, or get them terminated. A process to periodically review employee performance should be in place.

Our commissioners and elected department managers are not czars. County employees should have a clear understanding of what is expected of them. Regardless of what you call it, this is simply sound management.

BRENT REGAN

Kootenai County