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Published Thursday, August 07, 2008 in Local

County approves plan to reorganize administration

By Sarah Fay Campbell

The Times-Herald

The Coweta County Board of Commissioners voted to implement a new "organizational design" for county administration at its meeting Tuesday night.

The new organizational chart is the first recommendation of a committee formed to explore various facets of Coweta's government.

The new structure calls for a hiring of a third assistant county administrator and sets up division directors as liaisons between department heads and the assistant administrators. The new plan will require approximately three new hires.

In laying out the different departments and how they are linked under particular directors, "there were some similar services that seemed to be very disconnected," said Jan Alligood. Alligood, an executive with Georgia Power, is a member of the committee and gave the presentation to the commissioners. With the new structure, "a lot of our citizens will have a one-stop shop instead of having to go see so many organizations," Alligood said.

It will "improve your bench strength and ability to do some really serious succession planning for the future," Alligood said. Many of the long-time administrative employees, who know a lot about nearly every facet of the county's government, will begin retiring in the next few years.

Alligood said she was also challenging county staff to "do a really good job of writing new and improved job descriptions."

Alligood was "able to definitely put a set of fresh eyes and remind us that even though we are in our own world of government, there are other businesses out there and they function just fine without being as dysfunctional as we sometimes are," said Commissioner Leigh Schlumper.

The most important new hire will be the assistant administrator. Schlumper said that the commissioners have been asking County Administrator Theron Gay to hire a new assistant every year -- "and every year he does not," she said.

The new structure is not a great change. Assistant County Administrator Eddie Whitlock will still oversee all departments having to do with public works, the prison, and properties. Assistant Administrator Roxie Clark will still oversee the public safety and development divisions.

The third assistant would oversee the recreation and event division and the support services division. Former Finance Director Rick Smoot essentially served in that role until his untimely death last December, Gay said.

Then there are the division directors. Some department heads will be the division directors. But there will likely be a new position to oversee public safety, which includes the fire department, emergency operations, EMS and code enforcement, and the development divisions, which include planning, development and engineering, and building.

Gay said that, in most cases, he expects current employees to be promoted. In some cases, one person could serve as both a division director and department head.

There will be a bit of tweaking of the layout, Gay said. One particular item that may need changing is the transportation department. Right now, it's listed under public works, but there is a lot of engineering and planning involved in roads as well.

"We've got to work out how those are going to work," Gay said. He will be meeting with department heads Friday.

"You have a county full of employees with great talents and experience. And it's run very well," Alligood said. "By putting a little organization to it, it will run even better and more efficiently."

Commissioner Paul Poole thanked Alligood for her hard work, but cautioned: "One thing we have to be careful of is not having too many managers ... we have to have the people out in the field to do the work," he said. And the people in the field do a pretty good job. The new positions "will be pretty high-paying jobs," Poole said.

In other meeting business:

* The board voted to have development company Patillo remove the "wings" on the sign at the Coweta County Industrial Park. With the wings removed, the sign won't be as long, and it will be more in keeping with what was permitted, Gay said.

* The board recognized Jeff Key of the Coweta County Tax Assessor's Office, who recently received Appraiser IV certification, the highest level.

* The board gave approval for SouthTowne Motors to have a temporary vehicle sale at the former Adessa Auto Auction property on Raymond Hill road.

* The board voted not to object to several proposed annexations into the city of Newnan, but it's asking the city to abide by certain conditions. There were two requests for Gordon Road and two for Poplar Road.

The Poplar Road annexations are for office property near the proposed Piedmont Newnan Hospital.

The commissioners are concerned about more of the property along Poplar being annexed, which means that Coweta County government won't get transportation impact fees from those developments. Major upgrades to Poplar Road were to be paid for out of the county's transportation impact fees.

If those fees are not forthcoming, the improvements could be funded some other way or removed all together. Or the city of Newnan could agree to collect the fees and pay them to the county.

* Coweta County Water and Sewerage Authority General Manager Ellis Cadenhead gave a "spotlight" report on the authority's progress over the last year.

* The board briefly discussed mosquito control. Chairman Tim Higgins said he was asked by a constituent about spraying for mosquitoes.

"The county is so large ... it has just almost been impossible to do," said Gay. However, there are many things homeowners can do to reduce the amount of mosquitoes near their homes, such as getting rid of standing water.

The county has "streetlight districts" and could, theoretically, create a district where residents paid for the service. But the county would just have to contract it out.

Or, Gay said, the county could create a permit process, letting individual neighborhoods contract with pest control companies for the service.

* Commissioner Randolph Collins asked that county staff pursue a conceptual plan and cost estimates for changing the entrance to the Newnan Country Club/Newnan Pines subdivision. Collins said the entrance has been the scene of several collisions, and the changes would improve safety.

Plans are being designed for improvements at the nearby Greentop and Hal Jones intersection on U.S. 29, and Collins felt it would be a good time to consider the additional entrance to the highway.