The Story Behind Sour Grapes

I was injured on the job with the county. The doctor cleared me to return to work within seven to ten days after the accident. Howevever, former County Administrator Chris Cofty and Mark Pullium, the Finance Director, had an unwritten rule that no one could return to work with any restrictions until they were rated at 100 percent by the workers' comp doctor. My rating was no lifting over ten or fifteen pounds for a certain period of time. No problem. As the web person, I did not have to do much lifting. Since I couldn't return to work under this "unwritten" rule, I was out for seven weeks until the doctor cleared me to return work. The day I returned to work they abolished my job. Case of sour grapes? You bet ya. I was led to believe that I would be doing something else in the Information Systems Department when I returned to work; however, that just turned out to be a falsehood so that Mark Pullium didn't have to inform the Director of Information Systems and the Assistant Director of Information Systems (my department) until the day before the Board of Commissioners voted to eliminate my job based on Pullium's recommendation.
The most recent ethics complaint concerned the fact that the company who is currently doing the county's website received over two years of free advertising twenty-four hours a day seven days a week on the county's website. The server upon which the website resides is maintained, updated, and serviced by county employees on county time. So, in effect, Mr. Pullium approved the design of the new website along with the fact that a private company would be receiving free advertising courtesy of Fayette County taxpayers. Each page of the website listed the company's name as well as a hyperlink directly to their business. As soon as this ethic's complaint was made, all references to the company were removed, along with the hyperlinks. There is a reference to the company on the home page with no hyperlink, which is certainly more reasonable than having a private company advertising 24/7 on all the county's web pages.
The Ethics Ordinance states that employees should "Never discriminate by the dispensing of special favors or privileges to anyone, whether or not for renumeration;..." I would say since it was Mark Pullium's decision to approve the redesigned website as it was presented to him represents the "dispensing of special favors."
You can call that petty or whatever but it still merits an investigation and an investigation was not done. Period.
The first ethics violation filed by me concerned the fact that no disciplinary action was ever taken against Mr. Pullium with regard to the fact that he condoned and participated in the misuse of the county credit card system, a system he developed. As Finance Director, it's his responsibility to set the highest standards with regards to ethical behavior and fiscal responsibility. I'll let you decide if you think that he acted in a professional manner by using your taxpayer money to pay for his supposed "business lunches." Oh, by the way, Cofty and Pullium decided to eliminate my job during the time that they were ordering up their steaks at the county's expense. Was an investigation done into that Ethics Complaint? No, there was not. Have any changes been made to the county's credit card handbook since these misuses occurred? No, there has not been. So long as Dunn has Pullium as his lap dog, nothing will change.
It's interesting to note that Mr. Pullium would do a morning inspection to make sure that everyone was at their work station promptly at 8:00 a.m. (that is, if Mr. Pullium was there at 8:00 a.m. himself). No matter the fact that Information Systems employees are on call 24/7 and may have to respond to an emergency at the EMS center or a fire station at 3:00 a.m. to fix a computer or the network, that did not concern Mr. Pullium at all. He would suspiciously question those IS employees who were there on time about where the other employees were. Funny thing is, in one of Mr. Pullium's first personnel evaluations, the County Administrator, Chris Cofty, voiced concern over Mr. Pullium being late to work on a continuing basis.
To the writer so concerned with my health, maybe you need to, as the cliche goes, walk a mile in my shoes before making such condescending remarks. I hope that you nor your children ever get treated by an employer in such a shameful way. I also feel the same way for Mr. Pullium's children. I received excellent annual reviews. I think you would be hard pressed to find a county employee who disliked working with me. While I'm in complete sympathy with the Delta employees and their situation, at least they have had some notice that far-ranging changes were in the offing. Having your job jerked away from you without any warning at all will tend to make you a bitter person. Looking for over a year for a job without any responses will tend to make a person bitter. Maybe you need to look at yourself and decide if the same situation happened to you, how would you feel?

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Submitted by did not know on Fri, 03/17/2006 - 10:54pm.

Michelle Burns and Leo can %%@@@@ 20,000 plus elderly retirees and go find high paying jobs, what is your problem.?

Submitted by did not know on Fri, 03/17/2006 - 10:41pm.

I wish you would quit harping on Greg Dunn! First.... if the MD said ok you can go back to work if you don't lift anything ...over 10lbs....didn't it occur to you...??? that your pencil....or mouse....didn't weight that much? How did you get hurt in that dept in the 1st place? Did you grab 2 spliced wires? Surely you didn't fall on your pencil to get an OJI? Give it a break....leave the man alone and find a job....

nuk's picture
Submitted by nuk on Sat, 03/18/2006 - 1:09am.

No job for a year? No wonder they decided your position was unecessary with the county. It's not too hard to find a job in IT these days.

NUK


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Submitted by WakeUp on Mon, 03/20/2006 - 1:50pm.

As so many others around this site do, NUK and ATAS have missed the point. Instead of worrying why someone has tried over a year to get a job and having a hard time, review the problems this person has brought out. Ask questions concerning credit card abuse, free advertising, IT work hours, etc. Are there problems in this county or is everyone just making up a lot of BS so they can read their writings online? The county needs to have a shakeup and it needs to happen quickly. Let's focus on the county admin's problems before you attack an ex-employee.

By the way, lifting is not the only way to become injured on the job.

Also, think this through - Would you hire a person who returns from workers comp and then have their job eliminated? This scenario is prime for hugh questions from a prospective employer. The county gave him a bum deal and set them up for problems.


Submitted by thenatural on Mon, 03/20/2006 - 5:15pm.

Wake up...the point is very simple here. This guy had his job eliminated and he does not like it. So instead of being proactive in finding a job he consumes his time trying to harass his former employers, when there is no issue.
The questions he raises, as I understand it, have been addressed.
The credit card abuse cost the County Manager his job. The "free advertising" was removed as soon as it was brought to the attention of the new county manager. Not sure what you mean by IT work hours.
There are many jobs that require you to be available during non-business hours. In this case I am sure there was someone "on call" to handle emergency situations. Mr. Rogers seems to be leaving the impression that only he was on call. I am sure that he may have been on a rotation with other employees, but he was not on call 24/7.

The county needs a shake up because a job was eliminated (downsized, outsourced, whatever) and the employee did not like it? Where is the logic in that? Mr. Rogers, welcome to the real world. The same situation has happened to literally millions of people in this country over the past 20 years. The timing of the job elimination may have been unfortunate, but it is reality and is by no means unique to him. Job performance is irrelevant when it comes reducing budgets. In Georgia an employer can eliminate the job of anyone they want to, no questions asked.

And by the way, a prospective employer would only know the circumstances of Mr. Rogers situation if Marc told them. Otherwise the only answer he needs to give to an interviewer is ..."my job was eliminated", just like thousands of other Fayette Countians have been doing for years. I am not sure how he would respond to a question about what he has been doing for the last year, instead of looking for a job.

Submitted by Sailon on Mon, 03/20/2006 - 9:17pm.

The point has already been made that people simply aren't fired in government. If so, Fulton County wouldn't have any left. A death occasionally will require a retirement. Make up a list of fired employees: you won't need any paper. Until very recently, we even had to pay anyone fired for life for WHATEVER reason they were fired! Just how does Fayette think they can get away with it? I also doubt that if any personnel records were checked that everyone is also doing at least satisfactory with no criticisms of their work. It is wrong, but true, nonetheless. Government supervisors don't like controversy.

Submitted by thenatural on Tue, 03/21/2006 - 10:49am.

HG,

People are laid off by governments all the time. Fulton County laid off people when the city of Sandy Springs came into existence. They did this for two reasons. The services they had provided for this area were no longer needed (to some degree) and the loss of tax revenue made it a budgetary impossibility to retain some of them.

The people that the county paid after termination where under contract to the county. A common occurance for management level people in the public sector. Everyone else, including Mr. Rogers, are employees "at will" just like 90% of the people working in Georgia. The can be, and routinely are, fired, terminated, outsourced. Do they get a severance package? I don't know but I hope so, if for no other reason than to ease the transition into a new job. I would hope that Mr. Rogers got some kind of severance, but I do not know. I do know that it is not required by law, but it is the norm.

The county in my view is not trying to get away with anything. I think this is business as usual.

Performance appraisals are often not a true representation of the quality of work in any environment. At least it was that way when I was working in the corporate world for many years. So we agree that just because there was no criticism that the work was actually that good. That practice is not confined to the public sector.

Fayette County like all counties should be looking for ways to save the taxpayers money. If they can do this by outsourcing a certain job, then I believe they are obligated to do so. That is what happened here. The young man's job was eliminated and he is upset.
Most people I know who have gone through this get upset, even rant against their former employer, but they move on. That is what Rogers needs to do.

Submitted by Sailon on Tue, 03/21/2006 - 12:33pm.

As I said make me a list of known firings. Have you checked to see how many of the Sandy Springs county employees are actually without any kind of government job?
Glad you didn't argue about the evaluation reports never saying anyone is sub-standard. On rare occasions when a supervisor tries to do that, it is changed. Even the people who go for coffee and breakfast are rated well and so is the receiver of the coffee and breakfast. We are appraching European standards for public employees---none. Once hired, always somewhere.

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