{"id":14209,"date":"2020-11-11T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-11-11T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=14209"},"modified":"2020-11-10T20:30:16","modified_gmt":"2020-11-11T01:30:16","slug":"fix-it-or-own-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=14209","title":{"rendered":"Fix it or Own it"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Adam Pagnucco.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once again, the county council has expressed its displeasure at the administration of County Executive Marc Elrich. And once again, executive branch officials were invited to a Zoom thrashing that was less pleasant than most root canals. Chief Administrative Officer Rich Madaleno plays more defense now than beloved former Washington Capitals goalie Braden Holtby<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Right or wrong, this is turning into a regular thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The current object of the council\u2019s ire is the executive branch\u2019s administration of the county\u2019s COVID emergency pay program. The program was first established way back in April<\/a> by the executive and has continued without interference from the council since then. It is based on the erroneous notion that it was mandated in the county\u2019s union contracts when in fact those contracts referred to emergency pay in the context of weather events<\/a>. The program is bleeding the county budget by $4 million a pay period, or $100 million a calendar year<\/a>, and was discovered by the inspector general to be plagued with mismanagement and inflated costs<\/a> in at least one department. Unlike COVID pay programs in other jurisdictions, MoCo\u2019s has no defined end date.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the more troublesome revelations from the inspector general\u2019s report<\/a> was that managers at the Department of Permitting Services deliberately violated county policy in handing out undeserved COVID pay to employees. Madaleno\u2019s first response in the Washington Post was to characterize it as an \u201cunfortunate mistake.\u201d<\/a> He walked that back in discussion with the council<\/a>, but then his deputy chief administrative officer and the current permitting services director both told the council that it was a mistake. It was not. The inspector general said that the managers who awarded the extra pay \u201cdecided to allow inspectors to claim front facing differential for their entire workday rather than \u2018nickel and dime\u2019 them by asking that they account for individual hours.\u201d This was not a mistake. It was insubordination.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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