Back in August, the county commission – without a whole lot of discussion – passed an ordinance (second reading) that compels county employees to rat out each other if they suspect fraudulent, illegal, wasteful, blah, blah, blah activity in their department or by their fellow co-workers.
If they don't – and something bad goes down and they get caught not reporting it – then they face disciplinary action, even termination.
It's probably not a bad rule, except it doesn't provide whistleblower protection and there are no repercussions for rat-screwing an employee when you know they haven't done anything wrong, yet report something anyway.
And, yeah, that happens ALL the freakin' time in the Deathstar.
Anyhoo, we've beat this to death. Rebecca Ferrar (may she retire in peace) reported on it and the editorial board pontificated – or whatever they do – on it. So, consider this a short update, so I can feed the blog beast.
A number of department heads have told me that they do NOT like this ordinance and feel the county already has enough protections. There's the audit committee's tattletale line (where folks like to call up and accuse county Mayor Tim Burchett of getting drunk and using inmate labor to mow his lawn); and folks can yap to the toothless Ethics Committee.
Sooooooo, department heads now have employees in fear for their job, and they're reporting every stupid little rumor they hear. You know, just in case. Or they're just making crap up. I've seen/read some of the accusations. They're as asinine as the ones that come out of the tattletale line.
And there's no repercussion for reporting BS.
Good thing the commission really dove into this issue.
This is exactly what I was afraid was going to happen.
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