Committee allows county office to close for conference

Supervisor concerned about other county offices wanting to do the same

Taylor County will allow an office to be closed, but have staff available by phone to address client needs in order for staff members to attend a training conference this fall. Members of the Taylor County executive committee on Friday gave permission for the Child Support Office to be closed during the second week in October for three days to allow three of the offi ce staff to attend a training conference. An additional employee is expected to be on maternity leave at that time and unable to be in the office.

Michelle Kurth made the request noting the new person in the office as well as the person who handles financial reporting for the office would greatly benefit from the training offered at the conference. She said the senior specialist will be on maternity leave at the time. She said the office would be closed Wednesday, Thursday and Friday that week.

The executive committee serves as the oversight committee for the child support office. Kurth assured committee members that they would still be able to meet state guidelines in response times by having calls routed to their cellphones and bringing their laptops to the conference to work with clients between sessions.

Committee member Scott Mildbrand strongly opposed the plan. “I think the office should be open,” he said, noting he felt it would lead to issues in other areas of the county where offices may want to not be open. He said he also opposed it on grounds of not finding value in conferences.

“I think conferences are wastes of time and taxpayer money,” Mildbrand said. He said that he is aware that other departments get to go to their conferences and said that Child Support staff should have that same ability so long as the department remains open.

Committee member Mike Bub questioned if there was some way to have another department willing to serve as a contact point for someone who comes to the courthouse to use the office and who does not have access to phone or e-mail. County clerk Andria Farrand said her office would be able to assist people in getting them in contact with the correct child support staff members.

Bub said he does not want to see closing offices to attend conferences becoming a common practice.

Mildbrand said he was willing to allow them to go to conference as long as the office was open, reiterating that he felt it would cause issues elsewhere in the county. “I think that will come back to bite us,” he said.

“I just have to be true to myself,” Mildbrand said, expressing worry that allowing the child support office to close would start other issues back up again.

County board chairman Jim Metz disagreed about the value of conferences, noting that he feels he has gotten valuable information from any conference he has attended.

In the end, committee members voted 2-1 with Mildbrand opposed to allow the office to close for the conference.

In related action, committee members received the 2021 year end report for the child support program. The office has again met the performance goals necessary to maximize state funding of the program. The department actually brought in $505.09 more than its expenses. Child support collection in the county totaled $2,459,616.69 in 2021.

In other business, committee members: Approved a resolution to prevent outside funding of major donors such as the Koch Brothers or Zuckerberg. Bub raised this issue saying they wanted to preemptively prevent any outside groups whether they are conservative or liberal, to provide support for county-run elections. He said the county already does a good job and was concerned about the outside groups interfering with the election. County board member Lester Lewis noted that the county does not have the ability to tell municipalities they cannot accept money.

Discussed the need for a more formal orientation process to get new board members acclimated to how the county operates and the functions of the various committees. “As a new member coming in, I knew nothing. We are completely inept coming in,” said board member Sue Swiantek. Board member Lori Floyd said it would help to even have a flow chart that showed how which actions needed to go to which committees to be approved.