City to update employee handbook

The City of Portland’s employee handbook will be getting an update. 

Portland Board of Works signed a contract with New Focus HR to update the city’s employee manual for the first time in several years. 

Board members also approved an application for a sewer tap-in. 

The city’s employee manual hasn’t been updated in a few years, clerk-treasurer Lori Ferguson said, and several laws and ordinances have changed since then. 

“There’s so many things that are out of compliance and so many things that we had found that were just in error, the wrong verbiage, things that are just blatantly wrong in it,” Ferguson said. “We just don’t have time to go through it and amend the whole thing.” 

New Focus HR of Indianapolis, which has updated the city’s job descriptions in the past, will revamp the manual for $4,500. For $100 each subsequent year, the company will update the manual as needed. 

Board members Bill Gibson, Jerry Leonhard and Portland Mayor Randy Geesaman also approved a sanitary sewer tap for Steve Smith, who lives in the east 800 block of Division Road just outside the city limits.

The city will tap into a sewage line for a fee of $525 and Smith will be responsible for running the line from his house to the sewer main. 

Also on Thursday, the board approved a leak adjustment of $141.38 for a home owned by Cindy and Tony Giltner in the 1000 block of Boundary Pike.