As if there were any doubt that the city council have not been listening to what the citizens of our city have been telling them week after week, the latest memo from Tom Hatch(et), copied and pasted below, should remove any notion that they have one shred of interest in what the city wants. And by the way gentlemen, the citizens are the city, not you.
The city council operates like a collective personality disorder, anti-social, narcissistic monsters. There is no stopping them. They are going to do what they want to do and we will suffer the outcome. If you want clarity on the symptoms of these disorders, Google them. I believe Mensinger, Monahan, Bever and Righeimer’s pictures will be there.
Here is what goes down with outsourcing. Of those positions that are not offered as no bid contracts to friends of our no-ethics council members, contractors will underbid by leaps and bounds as to what they can deliver. Outsourcing is done because jack holes like the ones we have selecting the winning bids are NOT concerned with the quality of the services, only the cheapest price they can get.
One of my co workers, who lives in another county, asked me, “Do they (the city council) realize how stupid they look on a national level?” My reply, no. They are blinded by egos. I am mortified by what is happening to my hometown. Read Tom Hatch’s memo, and try not to weep.
From: HATCH, THOMAS
Sent: Wednesday, May 11, 2011 5:46 PM
To: CITY-ALL
Subject: Bumping Rights Noticing
Dear Fellow City Staff,
I wanted to let you know that tomorrow individual departments will be providing noticing of the bumping rights process to impacted employees. As you know, bumping allows for employees who have received layoff notices to be transferred to positions held by someone with less seniority, if the move is within the same department. This is a difficult process. We have effectively communicated with the leadership of impacted associations and have created informational letters and packets that seek to clarify employee rights and communicate the process.
We will be handing out 124 layoff notices, which include letters to some employees initially notified on March 17 and to those employees subsequently impacted by the bumping process. Approximately 29 initial layoff notices will be given to part-time employees impacted through the layoff bumping process.
Employees will have five working days to exercise their respective bumping rights and notify the Human Resources Division.
Each person receiving a layoff notice tomorrow will have a minimum of six months before they may lose their job. It is important to remember that the City is currently exploring the viability of outsourcing for selected service areas, and that no decisions have been made by the City Council. The six-month warning is a mandated process per our agreements with employee associations.
We will have representatives from the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) here tomorrow, in case you would like to talk to a counselor. Their services will be provided out of the EOC Facility between City Hall and the Police Department. On May 18 and June 7, the City has scheduled OC One-Stop Center, which provides career and employment assistance, to conduct workshops at City Hall for any interested staff. More information on the workshops will be included in the packets to employees and is also available from the HR Division. A representative from the state Employment Development Department will also be part of the workshops. Finally, we are working to create and schedule a workshop for any interested employees to support them in further preparation for any future interview process.
Tomorrow is an important day for all of us to support each other and this will be the entire organization’s top priority.
Respectfully,
Thomas R. Hatch
Chief Executive Officer
City of Costa Mesa
77 Fair Drive, Costa Mesa, 92626
Ph. (714) 754-5328 Fax. 754-5330
“P.S. If any of you plan on jumping off the roof, please do so from the rear so you won’t draw attention to the idiots running this circus.” – Tom Hatch(etman).
This whole concept of “bumping” is more evidence the system is broken. Let the best employees keep their jobs regardless with they were hired last month or twenty years ago.
And who decides who the best person is? Messinger and the Leprechaun Mayor?
Just like the private sector. If a company doesn’t want my services, I simply find another job.
But seriously, no organization wants to get rid of their best people. (With the possible exception of unions. As a union member in the past, my car was keyed because I didn’t claim over time for working an extra ten minutes to correct an error that I made.)
They say bumping rights? Don’t worry folks, in the public services and maintenance section there are around 70 or so employees there was one single over looked position. So, about 6 people will have bumping rights from the top down to try and secure that position. Oh! But alas, that one position has now also received a late layoff notice. So in fact, there is NO BUMPING there. By the way, that one position paid a whopping 50K per year, an average salary for a maintenance services worker.
The city council and their cronies speak often of bloated 200K salaries and huge unaffordable pensions. If anyone were interested in looking at the list of salaries on the city’s web site, they will see that there are no maintenance workers making that kind of money yet these orange shirt guys are the ones who are receiving layoff notices and will actually be losing their jobs. Search the list and after many pages you will see that the bloated 200K salaries and enormous city crushing pensions are enjoyed by police and fire personnel.
Good luck citizens when a crisis comes, and one will come because stuff always does happen. Those orange shirt guys who knew the city like the back of their hand and were not afraid to get those hands very dirty to save someone’s home or property will be gone gone gone, replaced by a guy getting a crappy pay check from some outsourced contractor. Don’t for a second think you citizens will get someone who cares to help when he is struggling to make rent. He won’t care, but those orange shirt guys did. They take pride in their work and their city. But at least we will save money.
keep da peace, and any others that peronalize a city manager or public sector employee: He works for the City Council, so when you criticize Tom Hatch (who I do not know at all), as Hatchetman, using his family name to signify a work action he is taking, it is offensive. Public sector employees in the managerial levels are doing what the majority of the Council has told them to do. When that majority changes, a competent city manager, changes accordingly. Please don’t include the city manager in personal references when it is uncalled for, why would anybody want to go into what should be an honorable profession, when they are going to be called offensive names for doing their job. How does he explain that to his wife and kids?
You’re kidding, right? Who do you think runs the city? Do you have any idea how management runs in a business or government? Hatch isn’t just some middle manager lackey in the building department. He runs the city. He is the executive manager, akjn to being a president of a company. He is not only responsible, he probably helped cook up this scheme.
And, if you get butt-hurt about name calling, maybe you should stay off the blogs where namecalling is not only common but encouraged.
You call it offensive because you disagree with what I am saying. A man’s integrity is his own responsibility, and if he sells it for a price, he pays a price. The price he has paid is a loss of respect. He is paying the same price that the city council members are paying, and getting a fat paycheck to soothe all the “offensive” things being said about him. Hiding behind management or “orders” from above are no excuse. I don’t give a damn what he tells his wife and kids. I am sure he’ll come up with something good.
Well put, Ms. Findley. As the city manager, Hatch also has to be the council’s flak catcher — a duty he must have know about when he took the job. “Politics,” as Mr. Dooley said, “ain’t beanbag.”