Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Malys celebrate 45th anniversary

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Outdoors with Tom Venesky: Latest Sunday hunting proposal a sham

<p>On Tuesday, Luzerne County Council will consider county Manager David Predi&#8217;s request to remove $150,000 from the 2018 reserve to pay for the contract that Pedri signed in 2017 to outsource processing of the county payroll to ADP, a New Jersey company.</p><p>I am opposed to the transfer of these funds and to the ADP contract itself for several reasons.</p><p>&#8226; County employees currently process payroll through New World System software, implemented in 2013 and costing more a million dollars.</p><p>Management is now negotiating a new contract with New World Systems, because we will continue to use New World software for financial records. So, why would we contract out with ADP for work that we are currently doing, within a program that we are already using and will continue to use?</p><p>&#8226; Management admits that the ADP contract will NOT save the county any money. On the contrary, it will add cost to payroll processing &#8211; work done now by county employees, who will remain employed and continue to do prep payroll work to send to ADP.</p><p>&#8226; The solution to human errors in payroll is not to pay more and outsource the work to New Jersey; it is better training and supervision of the employees who do the work already.</p><p>&#8226; Management claims that outsourcing the work will &#8220;free up&#8221; employees each January for annual audit work, since we will not be responsible for issuing W-2 forms by Jan. 31. But the annual county audit is due on June 30, and for the past several years has been completed on time, while our employees have done the payroll work. And many of the audit documents cannot be produced until the county closes its annual books in late February.</p><p>&#8226; Management says the ADP contract is needed to adjust the county payroll and synchronize pay cycles. The reality is that the adjustment of payroll could and should have been done by now, and it is a one-time fix &#8211; once it&#8217;s done, it&#8217;s done. An expensive and long-term contract with an outside vendor was not the only way to accomplish this.</p><p>&#8226; Pedri&#8217;s signature on the ADP contracted committed the county to nearly $200,000 in upfront costs, with ongoing costs of $5.50 per employee per month for 1450 employees, amounting to $100,000 per year &#8211; and additional fees for W-2s and other items. Over 5 years, the cost to the county approaches a million dollars.</p><p>While many companies outsource payroll work, I doubt that any of them are $300 million dollars in debt, and adding cost through the outsourcing.</p><p>&#8226; Along with the additional cost, I take issue with the manager&#8217;s May 2017 signing of the contract because of the large amount of money committed over several years.</p><p>The Home Rule Charter requires council approval for contracts requiring more than $25,000 to be paid a future year, yet the manager did not bring the ADP contract to council for approval.</p><p>Questioned about this in August 2017, the manager and solicitor defended their decision not to bring it to council, saying it did not commit the county to spending money in 2018 &#8211; because management intended to pay the entire first year&#8217;s cost before the end of 2017. This was an &#8220;end run&#8221; around council scrutiny and approval.</p><p>Pedri said then that it would be council&#8217;s decision to fund it for future years. He also promised to reconsider the agreement as no payments had been made to the company.</p><p>So, in adopting the 2018 budget, council voted to move the manager&#8217;s requested ADP funding into the reserve fund. Now, a few weeks into 2018 &#8212; with a new council &#8212; the manager requests $150,000 to pay for the contract signed without council approval. But the itemization of the request lists the payroll costs for all of 2018, although the current contract expires in May. If the entire amount of money is transferred, council is providing the funds for the manager to continue the contract into another year.</p><p>While there may be support among some council members for outsourcing this work, in spite of the additional cost to the county, I will not support this contract or its funding.</p><p>I encourage council colleagues to reject the transfer, or to table the vote pending council review of the ADP contract&#8211; and, most importantly, a council vote on the contract itself.</p><p>Luzerne County Council Member</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">McClosky Houck</div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/web1_McClosky_Houck-cmyk.jpg</photo0><caption0>McClosky Houck</caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>Linda McClosky Houck</p><p>Guest Colunmist</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Linda McClosky Houck is a member of the Luzerne County Council.</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Their view: Council should vote ‘No’ on ADP funding