Loading...
HomeMy WebLinkAboutCity Council Committees - Civil Services Commission - 11/21/1996 CITY OF KENT CIVIL SERVICE COMMISSION MEETING MINUTES November 21, 1996 Members Present: Mike Pattison Ron Banister Callius Zaratkiewicz Others Present: Chief Crawford, Chief Angelo, Lt. Curt Lutz, Debra Leroy, Lt. Holt, Dea Drake, Sue Viseth, Karen Ford, Officer Burwell, Captain Jim Miller, others present. Chair Pattison called the meeting to order at 8:07 a.m. I. COMMISSION BUSINESS: II. HEARINGS III. OLD BUSINESS A. Accept into Record 1. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the minutes from the October 17, 1996 Civil Service Commission Meeting. Seconded and carried. • IV. NEW BUSINESS A. Approval and Accept into Record 1. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the letter dated October 8, 1996 from Chief Crawford to Mr. Michael A. Schanbacher confirming his appointment as Probationary Police Officer effective October 15, 1996. Seconded and carried. 2. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the letters dated October 16, 1996 from Chief Crawford to Corrections Officers Cagle and Langsea notifying them of their successful completion of their probationary period effective October 16, 1996. Seconded and carried. 3. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the memo dated October 18, 1996 from Fire Lieutenant Robert A. Johnson to Chief Angelo announcing his intention to retire from the City of Kent Fire Department effective January, 31, 1997. Seconded and carried. 4. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the memo dated October 29, 1996 from Lieutenant Bob Holt requesting the extension of the Police Records Supervisor Eligibility List for an additional six months to April 26, 1997. This will extend the list to the eighteen months allowed. Seconded and carried. • Page 2 Civil Service Meeting Minutes November 21, 1996 5. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the certified letters dated October 30, 1996 from the Civil Service Examiner to Entry Level Police Officer candidates Frank B. Getty and Robert J. Wallace informing them that their names have been removed from the Entry Level Police Officers Eligibility List . Seconded and carried. 6. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the Certified letter dated October 30, 1996 from the Civil Service Examiner to Entry Level Police Officer candidate Stuart M. Chandler notifying him that as he does not wish to leave his current employer at this time that his name has been removed from the Entry Level Police Officers Eligibility List. Seconded and carried. 7. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the memo dated October 30, 1996 from Lt. Holt notifying the Commission that Officers Focht and Schanbacher were both hired on October 15, 1996 and that Officer Focht was hired senior to Officer Schanbacher. Seconded and carried. 8. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the Certification letter dated November 7, 1996 from the Civil Service Examiner establishing the Eligibility List for Police Records Specialist. Seconded and carried. 9. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the Certification letter dated November 8, 1996 from the Civil Service Examiner establishing the Eligibility List for Police Data Entry Specialist. Seconded and carried. 10. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the Certified letter dated November 15, 1996 from the Civil Service Examiner to Records Specialist candidate Gwendolyn Y. Hemphill removing her from the Records Specialist Eligibility List due to the fact that she did not get her proof of graduation to the Examiner until November 13, 1996 which was well after the twenty-four hour deadline grace period of November 6, 1996. Seconded and carried. 11. Chair Pattison moved to approve and accept into record the resignation letter dated November 15, 1996 from Police Officer Tarantino effective November 15, 1996. Seconded and carried. B. Action Items for Discussion 1. Chair Pattison opened for discussion the Revision to Rule VII, Qualification for Police Ranks. Lieutenant Holt gave the background history regarding the Rule change. City Attorney Lubovich stated that the only impact of the rule change was that it seems to eliminates the potential for Lateral hires. • Page 3 Civil Service Minutes November 21, 1996 Officer Bob Burwell, President of the Kent Police Officers Association stated that they had brought the proposed rule change before their members, they voted on it and are in support of the change. In a separate Executive Session the Executive Board endorsed the change. The Civil Service Chief Examiner stated that Rule IX, Section 6 covers that concern regarding promotional examinations: "If in the opinion of the Chief of the department and/or the Civil Service Commission, a vacancy in a supervisory position could be filled better by an open competitive examination instead of a closed promotional examination and if there is not already a promotional list for the supervisory position from which the vacancy could be filled, the Civil Service Commission may instruct the secretary and chief examiner to call for applications for the vacancy and arrange for an open competitive examination and for the preparation and certification of a promotional list." Human Resources Director Viseth stated that she had the same concerns as City Attorney Lubovich but that after meeting with Catherine and reviewing the Rule just quoted it alleviates her concerns. That if the need arose to open a supervisory position for open recruitment it is her understanding that under Rule IX, Section 6, that management could come before the Commission and ask for that. C/A Lubovich stated that he recommends that it needs to be addressed in the Rule to avoid any ., contradictory provisions. "Qualifications for the positions set forth in this rule do not prevent application of Rule IX, Section 6 for open examinations when deemed appropriate by the Commission." Chair Pattison motioned that the Commission adopt this Resolution as amended. Seconded and carried. 2. Chair Pattison opened for discussion the revision to Rule X, Examination Procedures. Lieutenant Holt: "I would again respectfully put forward to the Board the proposed change to Rule X, changing the wording from grading to appeals. Basically giving more definition as to what items or issues can be appealed in Civil Service Exams and again stating the number of days that the appeals can be brought forward to the Board." C/A Lubovich: "This is the Rule that I had a couple of comments on. First area is that I think that it is appropriate that we change this grading provision and clarify that it is really an appeal provision. It is a misleading provision in the code. Under the appeal, ten calendar days is appropriate but my only concern is whether upon completion of the examination I'm worried about due process issues. When you complete your exam, assuming that it doesn't get posted for a week. Lets make that assumption. I understand that it is posted rather quickly. You don't know what to appeal until you've had an opportunity to come in and look at the exam. Ten days, if it is posted one week later and you have three calendar days to appeal, you may not • have enough time for a decent appeal because you don't know what to appeal until you've seen your exam. It is my understanding that applicants have some access to review their exam or their scores or something upon completion." • Page 4 Civil Service Minutes November 21, 1996 Chief Examiner: "Not for those who come from outside." C/A Lubovich: "But internally." Chief Examiner: "I'd like to say that we are speaking to this with regards to internal promotional. This is what I use for grading for an open examination. It applies to both promotional examinations and open examinations. So grading needs to be a subsection. I would still follow the grading process for my entry level examinations." C/A Lubovich: "What process? The one we're establishing here?" Chief Examiner: "No. All I'm saying is that you're calling this section appeals when this section is about the examination procedure." C/A Lubovich: "Absolutely." Chief Examiner: "There still needs to be a section in here regarding grading." C/A Lubovich: "I was not finished here. My point is, in my opinion, it should be an appeal • period running either from the date of posting or date of mailing or something and not from the completion of the exam. There is more of a due process issue. In fact, they are actually posted pretty promptly and mailed rather quickly. Something could happen. It could be posted and you don't have sense of what you have to appeal until you've had an opportunity to see your grade and think it is way off. We've had instances where the grading of the math has been wrong. You wouldn't know that until you had an opportunity to come in and take a look at your exam. In some circumstances it could be a shortening of the period before actually having a right to appeal." Chief Examiner: "You also have people who are not here right after an exam due to vacation or days off." Chair Pattison: "So do you mind if we change the language. Take out 'completion of the examination' and insert 'posting of scores'?" Lieutenant Holt: "On the surface I don't have an objection to that. But what I worry about is an individual finding himself or herself on a position on the list and deciding that they want to file an appeal just because of the position they are on the list. That could be an issue. I don't think that it has happened in our Fire Department or our Police Department that I'm aware of. I know of other Police Departments where that has happened. That is one of the things that I worry about and that we've talked about at the Police Department." Fire Chief Angelo: "I agree with what Bob is saying. You would have a temptation to cause people to look at other peoples performance rather than at their own. I think that City Attorney was touching on a couple of items or possibilities. For example, either the date it was mailed or the postmark on the actual mailed results of the individual from the test might serve as a • Page 5 Civil Service Minutes November21, 1996 reference point and you might extend it a little bit because of different post marks from different areas not that much. I think that when you get into the business of looking at 'how I did versus somebody else'; if thats the basis of the appeal, then that might not be as appropriate as I look at my score and I felt that I did much better than this and I think that there is something else her. I agree with Bob that it is important." C/A Lubovich: "I have one comment. First of all if it is based on where they sit on the list it is a meritless appeal and the Commission would use discretion whether to hear an appeal on it. To set that aside, another way to deal with it might be to do it on the date of mailing and not post it for a while. Post it at the tenth day. I don't know if that is appropriate or not. If you did the mailing so that the only people who would know anything about their scores would be the individual applicant who receives his or her score, then on the tenth day the complete list is posted and the ranking. I'm worried about the due process issue. I don't know how you can appeal something if you don't what you have to appeal. I can see the concerns for the ranking but I don't know that if a ten day delay in posting would be a problem or not. You want an appeal thats appropriate you don't want to deal with frivolous appeals." Chief Examiner: "I'm supposed to send the candidates their results. Are you saying that I • don't tell them their ranking?" C/A Lubovich: "Why would you have to tell them where they rank?" Chief Examiner: "I always tell them if they rank one, two or three so they'll know if they are going forward." Human Resources Director Viseth: "But I guess what Roger is saying is do we need to continue to do that. Maybe in the notification to notify them of their score, you establish the postmark date and then within five working days of that notification you then post the list. I understand what Lt. Holt is saying too. I think sometimes just human nature is to look at where you're ranking along with your colleagues and decide to challenge based on some perceived fairness there rather than looking at your score and how you did as an individual. I know administratively that may be more cumbersome for Catherine. The letter would then give them their individual score without where they ranked. They then can make a determination based on their individual score whether they want to appeal and then five or ten working days thereafter the actual list is posted in ranking order." Chief Examiner: "For promotional, everyone knows who is testing. You can't tell me they won't share their scores. They are going to know where they ranked." Chief Angelo: "Within twenty-five minutes." • Chief Crawford: "Thank you. The attempt in this whole thing is to have an examination. Allow the period for people to appeal. Whether it be the content of the test, a test question was bad, or whatever. You can't have a test without a bad test question somewhere and certainly allow Page 6 Civil Service Minutes November21, 1996 that process. But not have a score published until that process is taken care of. That is all we're asking for. Its done all over the state. I've been involved in promotional exams myself that frankly your appeal process is after the exam. Go up and appeal whatever you are going to appeal. There will be a panel there to review in an objective way. If they say No to it, you're through. What has happened in so many places is that when exam scores come up then you can figure out all kinds of ways to want to appeal an examination. Now we can say you can only appeal objective concepts but we know how that can be dealt with. Thats all we're asking. Having a period of appeal. Whatever you want. They can appeal their exam as they see it but only before the exam score is issued." C/A Lubovich: "Thats not what this does. This just says ten day appeal from the date of examination and posted the next day." Chief Crawford: "Then let us take it back and revamp it." Captain Jim Miller: "One simple clarification. There are two issues here. There is an issue of what their score is and what their ranking is. What we are trying to establish,in this rule is that the list will not be posted in ranking order until after the appeal process. If I took the test and I • didn't like question number 52 because I did not feel that it was valid in subject content for the testing process or that the answer was wrong. I should be appealing question number 52 on its merits. When I appeal that it may change my score. Thats fine and that is the intent of this to allow that to happen. The intent is to have the ranking list not be published until such time until such time as all appeals of question 52 or any other question on the test have come and gone. So that I don't say, 'boy I think I missed question 52 it was a bad one but if I rank high enough on the list I not going to say anything about it because that might alter my scores and I might lower myself on the list'. That is the intent of this change we want." C/A Lubovich: "Well thats what I thought that it was suggesting, but that is not what the rule says." Chief Angelo: "I think it was very helpful to hear Chief Crawford give his explanation and I agree with him. I think what I hear you say Roger is that we need to find something that is more deliberate from which people can count on. I don't know if you extend the period or if you did it by some other mark but I support that. If , even before they get their score, they say 'I really have a bad gut feeling about either the way this test was conducted or something in it' and on that merit I'm going to go ahead and challenge it. I think that you are trying to preserve the ability to focus on that." CIA Lubovich: "Its a bit more complicated than that. What this rule does from all practical effect is to have an examination. You have ten days to appeal it from the date that you complete that examination. Catherine posts it the next day, so basically you have nine days • from the day its posted to appeal it. Its posted and the rankings there so you're really not doing what was intended by this rule. My only concern was in those instances where Catherine doesn't post the list for a week because of snow days, illness or vacation and it gets posted a Page 7 Civil Service Minutes November21, 1996 week later then there is only a three day potential appeal period. For all practical purposes the listing is posted the next day and so there is nine days in which to appeal from the listing. I don't think it meets the intent of the amendment. It sounds like we need to take it back, but my suggestion was to post it after the appeal period, then everyone will know what the rankings are because everyone will know their scores from talking to everybody." Chief Examiner: "Rather than sending out letters or even sending anything to the candidates they won't even know if they past their exam they won't even know if they passed or failed. Your idea would be not to post anything." C/A Lubovich: "No, I think that you could give them their results." Chair Pattison: "Before we send this back for rewriting I'd like to move on and find out if there are any other issues surrounding this rule change." CIA Lubovich: "I just have one comment on the B. in the appeals what it is based upon. Exam content is appropriate but I think that it might have to include procedure. There might be questions about the tester being in the rule half the time. Thats a procedure issue not a content issue. Thats my thought. I can see what the Police Department is trying to do is to eliminate • the concerns of frivolous appeals based on ranking period. I think that is appropriate because you shouldn't be able to appeal something because you don't like the you've ranked on the exam. I think that it is appropriate that we have subsection A on the mathematical errors go to the examiner because we have had incidences in the past where the grading was wrong, the template or whatever was wrong and that is something that Catherine could deal with internally without having to come before the Commission and delay everything. If they are not satisfied with the ranking at that point then they have a basis for a ten day appeal." Chief Examiner: "It worked rather well when we had to do a regrading to have one of the Commissioners come in and sit with me to do the regrading. The other provisio that you put into effect when we did have that problem was the fact that we would always have a third party checking all the grading before the results were posted." C/A Lubovich: "You can do that internally though, you don't need it in the rule change. Unless you think it is appropriate." Chief Examiner: "I think it should because they have taken out the grading section at the front of the rule and it is needed." C/A Lubovich: "Well, that can be added back in if the Commissioners feel that it is appropriate." Chief Angelo: "It would be helpful to me if the Police Department could clarify for the last time what is meant by content. For example I can envision exactly what Chief Crawfords said if we • had a question that appeared not to be applicable to the department or was worded in such a way that it was not understood, I can understand that part and would fully agree. If we're talking about coming back and looking at the broader scope of the test and saying that well, I Page 8 Civil Service Minutes November21, 1996 don't think that there should be anything on supervision in this test. That would be generic or a broader in nature that I don't think would be appropriate to the test. It would help me to understand and have Roger take a look at the wording." Lt. Holt: "Captain Miller I think expressed it best when he said that it is not meant as general as what you are taking it. It is meant to be those types of questions that are deemed inappropriate. Not on a wide scope its only those very limited types of questions." Chief Angelo: "Would it be fair then to say specific exam content and then give an example such as that?" Lt. Holt: "Yes it could be clarified?" Chair Pattison: "At this point we need a motion to table this item so it can be rewritten and brought back to us at our next meeting and take action on it. And to confer with Catherine especially with regard to the section on grading." Chief Examiner: "I think it could be moved over to section B." • C/A Lubovich: "You don't have to have that in the rule but if you want it to be in the rule then its clear." Chair Pattison motioned to table this item and have it brought forward at the next meeting. Seconded and carried. Chair Pattison opened for discussion the request for reinstatement dated November 18, 1996 from Corrections Officer Jill Kinsella with accompanying recommendation for approval from Chief Crawford dated November 15, 1996. Chief Crawford: "I wholly and enthusiastically support the rehire of Officer Kinsella because of her work in the past and the type of person and employee she is." Chair Pattison motioned to reinstate Officer Kinsella to the Police Department. Seconded and carried. There being no further business to come before the Commission Chair Pattison moved to adjourn. Seconded and carried. Adjourned at 8:45 a.m. • Page 9 Civil Service Minutes November 21, 1996 The next Regular Meeting will be held on Thursday, December 19, 1996 at 8:00 a.m. in Council Chambers West. Respectfully submitted, lc� Catherine M. Guiguet Civil Service Secretary & Chief Examiner Approv �.���.'�1 J Mike Pattison, Chair