by Mike Sharkey
Staff Writer
City Council member Glorious Johnson’s desire to essentially eliminate the Assistant Management Improvement Officer positions within the City through legislation is closer to being put in the hands of her colleagues.
Started under former Jake Godbold’s administration, the AMIO concept has evolved from a handful of positions held by close associates of high-ranking City officials to hundreds of positions — many of which come with above average salaries and no job description.
Johnson began her campaign to scale back dramatically on AMIOs in 2005. Her new bill — which should be introduced to Council in a month or so — seeks to reduce the current 200 AMIOs to 36. Of the 200, 164 of them will be transitioned into civil service positions while the other 36 will be phased out over time. The bill will also prohibit the hiring of new AMIOs.
Wednesday, Johnson met with Council Vice President Jack Webb, Council member John Crescimbeni and representatives from the mayor’s office, Human Resources, the Office of General Counsel and the Counsel Auditor’s Office to discuss the legislation and make final recommendations. She said the group will meet one more time to finalize the language in the bill.
“This is not before City Council yet, but I wanted to make sure it included everything that needed to be in there,” she said.
According to Chad Poppell, head of the City’s Human Resources department, the new legislation contains two significant changes. One, it will create a list of jobs that are exempt from civil service and, two, prevent the AMIO position from growing exponentially again.
“We will keep the job descriptions and pay ranges on file in HR,” he said, adding there will be a posting requirement for jobs that are currently filled by appointment. “If we are hiring externally, we will post the job so the general public can apply.”
The new legislation, Poppell added, will also clearly define City positions and place all positions under the purview of Human Resources.
“At the request of the Office of General Counsel, we will clearly delineate who has the authority to do what,” he said. “We need to clearly identify who sets the pay ranges.”
Currently, a review of the City’s jobs and pay ranges is conducted every four years. Poppell suggested conducting such a review annually. Steve Rohan of the OGC agreed and suggested the reviews begins in 2011 some time between January and March.
Johnson said since drafting the new legislation, she has gotten calls from current AMIOs who are worried about losing their jobs if the bill is passed by Council.
“They were not happy and were worried they were not protected,” said Johnson. “I explained they would not lose their jobs.”
Sherry Hall of the mayor’s office said Mayor John Peyton agrees with the legislation.
“It will be seamless to those already in the system,” said Hall. “It’s been needed for a long time and we are excited about the change.”
Webb said he’d like to see the Council and the City’s five Constitutional officers added to the review process to assure Jacksonville is on par with comparable cities concerning jobs and salaries. He also said the bill is almost ready to be submitted.
“I think we are getting pretty close,” he said.
Johnson said the main purposes of her bill are to end new appointments, absorb the current AMIOs into civil service positions and establish guidelines for those positions and be fiscally responsible to the taxpayers.
“Our constituents are concerned that during tight times we have all of these high salaries,” she said.
356-2466