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NCACC, LGFCU reward innovation County employees associated with 10 programs earn LGFCU Employee Productivity Awards
The NCACC honored employees associated with 10 county programs on Aug. 27 for successful productivity initiatives. Winners of the 2009-10 Local Government Federal Credit Union (LGFCU) Employee Productivity Awards (formerly known as the Ralph Ketner Employee Productivity Awards) each received $1,000 (divided if submitted by a team of employees) and certificates of recognition during the Opening General Session of the Association's Annual Conference in Pitt County. Each year, LGFCU donates $10,000 to reward outstanding county employees for their successful productivity initiatives. This year marks the Association's 19th year in organizing the program and the second year of LGFCU sponsorship. To date, the program has attracted 1,440 project applications representing more than $113 million in savings to counties. NCACC President Mary Accor appointed two review committees made up of commissioners, managers, county staff, and UNC School of Government faculty. One committee considered applications from managerial staff and one reviewed those submitted by line staff. The review committees met Aug. 6 to consider all eligible applications.
Heating Equipment Conversion  Rising fuel oil costs for Ashe County's two largest facilities – the county courthouse and the county agriculture building – coupled with a new law enforcement center that opened in February 2010, drove Maintenance Supervisor Barry Woodie to rethink county HVAC fuel sources. He worked with a local natural gas company to extend gas lines and retrofitted existing HVAC equipment to burn natural gas instead of oil. He manually changed 42 orifices and two pressure regulators on the boiler system in the courthouse, and reconfigured equipment at the agriculture building to accept natural gas. His work enabled the new law enforcement center to be completed with a natural gas HVAC system in place. In return for an investment of $8,500 to convert the heating equipment, the county has saved nearly $33,000 in direct heating costs. Because natural gas burns cleaner and allows the boilers to run more efficiently, the conversion has lowered maintenance and monitoring costs as well. Human Services Expansion/Improvement via Strategic Management Initiative  With county revenues plummeting and social services caseloads increasing, Buncombe County Human Services could no longer "be all things to all people." Instead, the department refocused its mission to concentrate on mandated services. Buncombe County's team of human services planners reviewed each service offered by social services and categorized them as core or optional. For optional services, the team worked with program staff to identify and coordinate with community groups to assume provision of these optional services. Smart partnerships with community providers not only expanded service access but also instilled a greater sense of community involvement and responsibility. The team also looked internally to streamline processes, staff training and retention, and make other administrative efforts more efficient. It effectively moved departmental staff from thinking "we need more staff" to asking "are we the best provider and can we do this better or smarter?" The results were significant and widespread. With a careful focus and evaluation of children entering the foster care system, the team saved nearly $177,000 in foster care expenses. Child welfare staff recruitment and retention was revamped to reduce employee turnover, saving an additional $100,000. A thorough analysis of daycare administration led to an agreement with a regional childcare subsidy organization to administer the program, saving $151,000 in daycare expenses. These savings were reinvested into core services, and departmental positions were shifted to high-demand economic services. Regulatory permits are now issued faster, and drug screening costs are significantly less. Crisis Intervention/Jail Diversion Program  Buncombe County faced a severely overcrowded jail with a rising number of mentally ill inmates being inappropriately housed. With few community mental health services targeted at this population, the county's incarceration rate was well above the national average. To combat this growing problem, Behavioral Health Supervisor Rich Munger implemented a number of initiatives including a crisis intervention program to de-escalate mental health crises and a jail diversion screening program for post-arrest cases. Munger established a training program for local law enforcement officers to recognize the symptoms of mental illness and to divert individuals in crisis to other community resources rather than taking them into custody. Defendants taken into custody are screened for jail diversion or early release by undergoing mental health and substance abuse assessments. If released, defendants are supervised in the community and their treatment is monitored. Reports of compliance are furnished to the court. Pretrial screening speeds release time because the court does not have to wait for the 48 hour bond assessment. For inmates being released, case managers engage in pre-entry planning to ensure proper referrals to community services are made and bridge medications are available to lessen recidivism. At the time the county applied for the award, 89 percent of defendants who were released had either successfully completed treatment or were actively participating in the program. Based on the average length of stay, nearly 10,000 jail days have been saved by early release. The crisis intervention program prevented more than 1,000 arrests, saving in excess of $2.3 million. In addition, the county's jail population is at its lowest point in 10 years. Educational Services Initiative  Transitioning into foster care is not easy for a child. To try to make this transition as easy as possible and to minimize the number of school moves, Catawba County started an Educational Advocate Initiative with a goal of improving educational continuity and stability for children in foster care. A county educational advocate works with each of the 44 schools in the county for all children in foster care. Each school assigns a staff person to work as the point of contact with the educational advocate. The educational advocate focuses on establishing communication channels and standardizing communication protocols between social services and the school systems; minimizing school moves for children in foster care; developing timely enrollment procedures; and tracking school placements and educational progress of children in foster care. One of the primary goals for the educational advocate is to assure coordination of transportation in order to minimize school moves or to facilitate school record transfers for children entering foster care. The advocate also spearheaded a "Back to School Backpack" drive to ensure that each child in foster care had a backpack and the necessary school supplies to start school and foster care. Mass Garnishments Cleveland County's garnishment program was largely manual and took too much time and wasted too many resources. Individual garnishments took 30 minutes each and were difficult to track for payment and employer action.  To collect delinquent taxes more efficiently and cheaply, Tax Collector Linda Wiggins worked with her software developer to program a mass garnishment system. By accessing the Employment Security Commission's employer and employee files, the system can now automatically generate the first notice to the taxpayer and then submit the delinquent debt to the employer for wage garnishment. With this new system, Cleveland County has gone from processing 100 garnishments per month to 1,600 per month. Not only is the county seeing an increase in its collection rate, but it is also realizing $23,000 in staff savings. Crisis Intervention Program
Like many counties, Cumberland was facing a growing number of mentally ill residents being thrown into the criminal justice system – a system ill equipped to meet the complex needs of mentally ill persons. To combat this problem, a planning committee was formed to develop the resources to create the Cumberland County Crisis Intervention Team (CIT), an innovative jail diversion program that trains law enforcement officers on how to better respond to individuals in mental health crisis. Working with the local chapter of NAMI and Fayetteville Technical Community College, Cumberland County Mental Health Center Director Hank Debnam and his team developed a training program that features 40 hours of training for local law enforcement officers. Skills such as de-escalation techniques, training on mental illnesses and personality disorders, and understanding of the mental health commitment process and medication issues help police and sheriff's deputies more readily cope with mental health crisis situations. The community college awards continuing education credits for officers who participate in the training, and officers who complete the coursework and pass the end-of-course evaluation are certified as CIT officers. A state grant funded the startup costs with no expense to county taxpayers. In 2009, CIT certified officers responded to 100 calls involving mentally ill persons in crisis – 28 of whom would have likely resulted in incarceration prior to CIT. Given the cost of jailing mental health clients and their average jail stay, the program has already saved the county $1 million. Even more importantly, mentally ill residents in crisis are receiving more appropriate and coordinated treatment to lessen the likelihood of future crisis situations. Mental Health Assessment Program In response to state and county budget cuts for mental health services, limited resources must target available services to those clients most in need, and those services must be delivered in the least restrictive, most cost-effective setting. However, the current evaluation system that has client assessments driven by private providers could self-refer patients to those highly intensive, costly services offered by that provider.  A partnership between the Durham Center – the county's mental health authority – and the Durham County Criminal Justice Resource Center created an independent assessment agency that conducts clinical assessments for clients seeking mental health and substance abuse services. Housed at the county's well-known behavioral health crisis center, the DAT doesn't provide any client services that might influence its referral decisions. Instead, service referrals are made strictly on clinical need and financial eligibility. By comparing client referral data, private provider assessments referred 90 percent of clients to high-intensity, high-cost enhanced services. DAT referred just 47 percent to these enhanced services, and 25 percent were referred to a no-cost community program. The Durham Center has been able to absorb a $1.4 million budget reduction without placing any consumers on a wait list for services. Furthermore, it has reallocated funds to provide more intensive services for individuals with severe and chronic mental health disabilities that in the past have resulted in homelessness, criminal justice involvement, unemployment and hospitalization. This independent assessment model has now been adopted via the state budget as the preferred statewide model. Inspections Central Software Gaston County replaced a cumbersome paper-driven process for its building inspections with a mobile service that enables inspectors to spend more time in the field and makes the system more accessible for citizens and contractors.  The new system eliminates the need for trips to the office for inspectors, who download their daily itineraries from their home. Inspectors can spend the entire day in the field conducting inspections without making repeated trips to the office to turn in reports and pick up assignments. The inspector records the data on a mobile unit and transmits the information back to the county using a wireless service. The system also includes a portable printer so that an inspector can print out the details of any previous inspections on a site to see if there are specific items that need to be followed up with. Citizens and contractors also benefit because they can see the results of the inspections as they are posted on the county's Web site, and the program even has a module that allows contractors to schedule an inspection or cancel an existing appointment. Cost Savings for Postage and Certified Mail  Higher postage costs, incorrect addresses and manual certified mail tracking led William Brantley to rework the county's mail service. He worked with Pitney Bowes to facilitate lower standard postage rates and rate reductions for certified (return receipt) mail. His plans included technology upgrades, revised sorting methods, standardized mailers and bar-coding. Automatic address look-up ensures that mail can be delivered the first time, saving time and eliminating additional postage costs. Electronic certified mail not only saves postage but also allows the sender to track its status online. With certified mail costing $1.20 per piece less and up to 15 cents in savings per regular mail, these changes are annually saving Pitt County Government approximately $17,000 and Pitt County Schools almost $1,000. Jail Health Medication Costs Reduction
Robeson County has one of the largest county jails in the state, a 410-bed facility that frequently operates at more than 100 percent capacity. As a result, the county's costs associated with providing medical care for inmates were escalating rapidly. Robeson County Jail Health Services set out to reduce those costs while maintaining the level of service needed. The team implemented several productivity improvements including: instituting a physician peer review of psychoactive medication prescribing methods, which resulted in a decrease in prescriptions; contracting with hospitals and area providers for discounted billing rates; revising the medication formulary to focus on lower-cost generic medications when available; and educating inmates about caring for themselves when they are released. From fiscal year 2008-09 to 2009-10, the department saw a reduction in its expenses from $1.55 million to $1.19 million – a savings of almost $360,000. The county attributes approximately $45,000 of the savings to reduced costs for medication, while the emphasis on generics and the peer review program saved an estimated $20,000. |
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