Will County Gazette

Will County Board Ad-hoc Ordinance Review Committee met Feb. 20.

Here are the minutes provided by the committee:

I. CALL TO ORDER 

II. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE 

Mr. Butler led the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag

III. ROLL CALL 

Chair Vince Logan called the meeting to order at 9:00 AM

Attendee Name	Title	Status	Arrived
Vince Logan	Chair	Present
Sherry Newquist	Vice Chair	Present
Daniel J. Butler	District 3 (R - Frankfort)	Present
Mica Freeman	District 8 (D - Plainfield)	Late	9:10 AM
Mark Revis	District 8 (R - Plainfield)	Absent
Sherry Williams	District 5 (D - Crest Hill)	Present

Present from the State's Attorney's Office: P. Mock

Also Present: K. Fladhammer

Minutes Provided by: S. Ceci

IV. APPROVAL OF MINUTES 

1. WC Ad-Hoc Ordinance Review Committee - Special Meeting - Jan 16, 2024 9:00  AM

RESULT: APPROVED [4 TO 0]  MOVER: Daniel J. Butler, District 3 (R - Frankfort) SECONDER: Sherry Williams, District 5 (D - Crest Hill) AYES: Logan, Newquist, Butler, Williams ABSENT: Revis AWAY: Freeman

V. OLD BUSINESS 

1. Review of Changes to the Will County Ordinances Chapter 36.022 - 36.009, 37,  38, 39, 40, 41, 42, and 43 

(Phil Mock)

Mr. Logan stated we are starting at §36.008 Prohibited Activities

Mr. Mock asked to go back to §36.007 Incumbent Employees; the reason I wanted to go back to §36.007 is you may want to strike the whole provision. The only reason the provision was there is in 1988 they wanted to know how to deal with incumbent employees when the new provision was made. But there are no longer incumbent employees under this provision. Everybody is put into Certified Service, which means they employee is in IMRF. This was put in to deal with transitional employees.

Members of the committee had a discussion and decided to take §36.007 out of the ordinance.

Mr. Logan said let’s move on to §33.008, which is Prohibited Activities.

Ms. Newquist asked what does County Classified Service means.

Mr. Mock advised the committee that it means employees that are covered under our benefits. It doesn’t apply to contract employees.

At this juncture Ms. Freeman arrived at the meeting.

Mr. Logan stated in section (E) it stated new employee and personnel.

Mr. Mock said we no longer use Personnel Department, it should read Human Resources, because they changed it from Personnel Department 20 years ago.

Mr. Logan said let’s move on to G, Ms. Williams said it says unlawful discrimination, is there such a thing as lawful discrimination.

Mr. Mock explained the term is called unlawful discrimination under the State’s Human Rights Act. There is lawful discrimination when you get into the Highway Department and they are talking about contracts and trying to send them to minority based contractors, and female contractors the is technically a discrimination yet it is lawful because it is a state sponsored policy to give to one party that you are not giving to another.

The committee members reviewed the changes made and any questions they had on the reason certain terms were corrected Mr. Mock explained to them.

Mr. Logan asked about why we added item (5) in §36.018 Longevity.

Mr. Mock stated when I talked to Human Resources, they said that is our current policy. It says if you leave county employment for more than 5 years your clock starts over, and you lose your longevity. The reason they picked it is because they wanted to get it past the electoral switch, due to the four-year election cycles. They don’t expect a new office holder to re-hire somebody the first day they came in, so they gave them a year that is why they picked 5 years. You can pick what every length you want because it is a policy decision.

Ms. Williams said Council 44 should be Council 31.

Ms. Fladhammer asked if HR could set that policy for 5 years without the board’s approval.

Mr. Mock stated I believe the County Board did approve it in contracts, so they adopted it, but it was not in our formal rules.

Ms. Fladhammer asked what if we move paragraph three to become paragraph two, saying that the initial payment is $6.00 per month after three years of full-time service. Then 2 becomes three, which is longevity is then computed on an additional $2.00 per month per every year completed.

Mr. Logan stated next is §36.019, do these supersede a CBA (Collective Bargaining Agreement).

Mr. Mock said no, that is why I added language to explain. The importance of this language is because it covers anybody that is not in a CBA.

Ms. Fladhammer asked if it is true that you don’t get your two weeks until after you have completed a year of service.

Mr. Mock replied yes, that is correct. Some office holders do it differently, some will give you a week after 6 months and then after the time when you get your vacation, they would deduct the time you took off. This is a policy so that you can’t get less than this.

Mr. Logan said for a leave of absence you changed 90 days to 240 days.

Mr. Mock said that HR told me it was 1,920 hours, that is why I put days in parentheses, HR always goes by hours.

Mr. logan asked to explain credible service, can you use that toward retirement.

Mr. Mock replied yes, when you retire you get paid half of your sick days under IMRF, and the other half goes towards years of service.

Mr. Mock will check with HR on how the sick days are and we will have an answer as to keep it in or take it out.

Mr. Logan said for bereavement can we just make it three days and if they want to come back earlier they can. I would like to take out of maximum and put in up to three days off. Also, with a spouse or child you can take up to ten days, but not necessarily get paid for that time, and under personal days I would like to strike out excluding recreational purposes. We would like to make any use of a personal day on a day adjacent to a holiday shall not be allowed.

Mr. Mock stated personal days are probably the only time off other than sick days where it is at the discretion of the employee. The employer can deny you your vacation time; some departments have black out days for vacations. If you want to make where it can be adjacent to a holiday, I will take out at the discretion of the employee, so the employer still has some discretion.

Ms. Williams added to the conversation that if you do not use your personal days, you can add them to your sick days.

Mr. Logan stated we are going to start next month at §36.022 Disability.

Mr. Mock stated I sent out to everybody up through §37.00 Courts, County Library. I already went through and double checked 38, 39, 40, 41, and 42.

Mr. Logan said §38.00 Public Records, and §39.00 are not on the agenda.

Mr. Mock said yes, they are, they are under Old Business, Review of Changes to the Will County Ordinances.

Mr. Mock said then I will send §39.00 that is missing.

Ms. Fladhammer said we have it.

Ms. Newquist said I know that we decided that we were going to get through all this before we read it to the Board, I think we might need to bring this to the Board Members in smaller chunks.

Mr. Logan said we already have issues with people not reading stuff that comes through the Board, so the last thing I want to do is give them something and not let them be able to read it.

Mr. Mock added you guys can advance that out however you want. Ms. Fladhammer, with that I want to talk to you, and I want to figure out our format for and look how we want it presented. I will get all the stuff that we have done so far to match consistently.

Ms. Fladhammer asked if everybody agrees with Ms. Newquist’s request. That you pick a point, if you want to do whatever chapters we’ve done and then Mr. Mock can make those changes and then you guys can go through them one more time with all your notes before we move it to the Executive Committee. Then Mr. Mock and I will work on all the formatting and use it going forward. I feel like you all will need one more opportunity to go through it and compare it to your notes.

Mr. Logan stated we are on page 114, so I don’t want to drop 133 pages on somebody.

Ms. Fladhammer added, and I don’t think you should be in the middle of a section either. You are in §36.00 so I would choose a section before that.

Mr. Logan said we should do the ones and see how it goes over at the board meeting, because if they ask a lot of questions then we know for a fact that they will have a lot of questions about everything else. We will see what kind of push back we get.

Ms. Fladhammer stated I would suggest giving the whole thing because people will jump ahead and move around.

Mr. Mock suggested taking three or four chapters at a time when you send them out.

Ms. Fladhammer stated if you were to take it to your caucuses and have conversations on issues that the Republicans or the Democrats have and work those things out before it goes to the full County Board, and then we are not doing all this debating on the County Board floor.

Mr. Mock stated you can bring it to the caucuses even before the Board considers it. Perhaps bring it to the caucuses the month before you want it to move to the County Board, that may give you enough time to have everyone review it. I am more than willing to go to the caucuses and answer any questions.

Ms. Newquist said I don’t think this is going to become too partisan of a thing. VI. OTHER OLD BUSINESS 

VII. NEW BUSINESS 

VIII. PUBLIC COMMENT 

IX. ANNOUNCEMENTS/REPORTS BY THE CHAIR 

X. EXECUTIVE SESSION

XI. ADJOURNMENT 

1. Motion to Adjourn @ 10:30 AM 

RESULT: APPROVED [UNANIMOUS]  MOVER: Mica Freeman, District 8 (D - Plainfield) SECONDER: Daniel J. Butler, District 3 (R - Frankfort) AYES: Logan, Newquist, Butler, Freeman, Williams ABSENT: Revis

XII. NEXT SCHEDULED MEETING TO BE ANOUNCED

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