Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Personnel Committee Set After Executive Session

Nevada County Quorum Court members adjourned to about a 30- minute executive session during its regular meeting Monday, June 8.

JP Gary Lewis moved to go into executive session, though no reason was given by the group before leaving the courtroom.

An executive session under Arkansas law must be for the specific purpose of considering employment, appointment, promotion, demotion, disciplining or resignation of any public officer or employee.

This does not include general discussion about making policies related to these.

JPs voted after returning from the executive session to appointed a committee to revise the personnel policy. A new committee was appointed to include JPs Lewis, Curtis Johnson and Willie Wilson.

Lewis said after the meeting that policy was not discussed in the closed session, but a specific incident involving a specific courthouse employee getting paid for working Wednesday, June 20, (the day following the preferential primary) without that employee actually working.

JPs have in the past battled accusations that some courthouse employees have been paid while not being present at their jobs in the courthouse all with the knowledge of the employees supervisor and/or the elected official's knowledge.

The committee has not set a date in which they will meet, but plan to meet with County Judge James Roy Brown one afternoon. The committee meeting will be open to the public like regular quorum court meetings.

Nevada County Sheriff Steve Otwell gave JPs a brief overview of a new policy regarding long distance and telephone usage in his office after JPs noticed phone bills had climbed to nearly $1,000 a month, nearly depleting the budget for 1998.

Otwell told JPs each employee has been given a code and will be required to use the code as well as fill out a log book for each phone call.

Sheriff Otwell stated that if employees make a long distance call without logging the call, they will reimburse the office for the call.

Otwell also presented a budget for the Drug Awareness Resistance Education (DARE) program.

Budgeted items included the salary of the DARE officer as well as part-time work by secretary Judy Gregory.

Gregory is current secretary for the Sheriff's office. She told JPs during the May meeting she would do the DARE work after regular working hours.

Speed limit of 35 miles per hour has been set on County Road 18, which is commonly called Wildcat Road.

The road begins next to the Prescott Piggly Wiggly store and continues past the Redland community.

JPs approved issuing checks to Arkansas CAMA and the Assessment Coordination Division for $8,000 and $3,981 for a computer system and software for the Nevada County Tax Assessor's office.

The $11,900 will be reimbursed to the county from the state. The computers are hooked into the Treasurer's office.

The system is being used in all county offices across the state.

In other action, JPs approved spending $8,500 to repair two steel beams and a steel joist under the Nevada County Courthouse.

James Cox, owner of Cox Welding in Prescott, told JPs he can repair the damages, which are located under the maintenance room behind the jury box.

Officials speculate the rust and corrosion came from years of drainage by the original heating and cooling unit on the roof of the courthouse which drained through the room onto the ground under the building.

Cox said the job should take about 40 hours and he expects to work three weekends to do the job.

He said the county will have to turn the gas off on Fridays after the courthouse closes and check for gas leaks.

In addition, Cox said, the electricity will need to be shut off and locked out since some wiring is under the building in the area he will be working.

Cox said he has already talked with his liability insurance carrier and will present his policy for coverage up to $1 million before beginning the job.

Cox said his work will be done on Friday nights and Saturdays.