Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/140592
Sarasota News Leader June 28, 2013 noon wore on. Because of board complaints over the past year about how accounting procedures have clouded actual spending on construction projects, County Administrator Randall Reid and his staff dismantled the Operations and Maintenance (O&M) Department. Instead, as Reid put it in his June 21 budget PowerPoint presentation, "Service responsibilities are aligned directly to the responsible departments." Page 54 maintenance. That change is designed "to ensure optimal service delivery and responsibility," Reid's presentation pointed out. However, those changes meant more than 5,000 line items had to be adjusted before the FY 2014 budget could be drafted, Reid said, and that work was not complete by June 21. Those missing line items, Robinson told staff, made it impossible for her to comprehend the actual staffing changes being proposed for Starting with the 2014 fiscal year, if a Parks each department. and Recreation Department employee spends time on a project such as the planning for im- "It's been very frustrating to me as well," Reid provements at Siesta Key Public Beach, for said. example, that expense will be reflected in the Parks and Recreation budget — not the O&M For example, the Natural Resources Department's one-page slide in the PowerPoint prebudget. sentation indicated the total number of fullThe other major change has been the creation time equivalent (FTE) employees it has in the of two new departments — General Services current fiscal year is 46, while 46.35 will be and Field Services, which oversee county included in the FY 2014 budget. Commissioners Charles Hines and Nora Patterson consider funding requests by Sarabeth Kalajian, the county's library system director. Photo by Norman Schimmel