Commissioners back pay policy

A complicated holiday pay policy for Jay Emergency Medical Service employees received backing from Jay County Commissioners on Monday after reassurances from JEMS director Pat Frazee that the policy adds no cost to the county and is being administered fairly.
“It can be a little confusing,” commissioner Faron Parr told Frazee. “Everybody was reading it differently.”
As explained by Addie Rooker, a senior consultant for Waggoner, Irwin, Scheele and Associates, in a memo, “The intent of the policy is to provide employees with a bucket of holiday leave hours for time off work equivalent to holiday time that is granted to other county employees.”
Parr said concerns had been raised about fairness in scheduling and whether the system added expense to the county.
Frazee noted that the rotating schedule assures that work on holidays is handled fairly and said JEMS employees can also make arrangements to trade work times.
“It’s not costing the county anything (extra),” she said. “It’s been that way for years.”
In other business, commissioners:
•Re-appointed Bill Hinkle and Brad DeRome to four-year terms on the Jay County Hospital Board of Trustees.
•Learned the drive to the Boy Scout facility near the Jay County Landfill has been graded in advance of Election Day, when the scout building is used as a polling place.
•Set in motion the legal transfer of eight properties that went unsold at a March 30 tax sale to the City of Dunkirk. The city, which will share half the costs of the legal work, intends to raze abandoned houses and get the properties back on the tax rolls.
•Heard concerns from Michael D. Landers about a proposed confined feeding operation adjacent to his property on county road 400 North. Landers asked to be placed on the agenda for next week’s meeting.