BY THE NUMBERS• 120: Personnel hearings statewide that Tennessee administrative law judges heard outside Metro Nashville in 2010• 22: Personnel hearings that Tennessee administrative law judges heard in Metro Nashville• 10: Personnel hearings heard last year in ChattanoogaSource: Tennessee Administrative Procedures Division, Chattanooga
The Chattanooga City Council is expected to vote Tuesday whether to allow state administrative law judges to oversee local personnel hearings, but at least one council member thinks the hearings do not go far enough.
“I can’t see where we say this group of employees has more value than another group,” Councilman Russell Gilbert said Friday.
The proposed ordinance follows a voter-approved change to the city charter in November that allows a change in how the council holds personnel hearings.
For years, the council has picked a three-person panel, with one alternate, from among themselves. But scheduling conflicts, knowledge of the case or relationships with those involved in the hearings made it difficult to find panel members.
City Attorney Mike McMahan said the new law allows the council to farm out personnel hearings.
The city attorney’s office has worked closely with theTennessee Administrative Procedures Division, made up of administrative law judges. The division conducts all personnel hearings for Metro Nashville and hears some other cases statewide.
Gilbert objects that whatever the structure of the hearing board, the rules for who gets a hearing are unfair.
McMahan said police officers and firefighters are allowed an appeal hearing no matter how small or large the punishment. But any other employee who wants to appeal a personnel decision must show he or she has lost 10 percent or more of their income over a three-year period.
McMahan said that regulation took effect with the city charter in 1991.
“It was to keep the City Council from being overburdened by appeals,” he said.
The Department of Public Works uses short-term and long-term suspensions frequently, much more than the police or fire departments, he said.
City officials were unable by press time Friday to say how many suspensions were handed down last year for Public Works employees compared to other departments.
Gilbert said the unequal treatment bothers him.
“It should be all,” he said.
Instead of having half-day or full-day suspensions, there should be written warnings, he said.
Council Chairman Manny Rico said he thought that would mean too many hearings, which the city will have to pay the administrative law judges to oversee.
“They would cost too much,” he said. “It opens up a can of worms.”
Judge Thomas Stovall, chief administrative law judge for the Administrative Procedures Division, said he does not think it would be a problem for his staff to hear the cases.
He said his office handles all Metro Nashville personnel hearing cases right now. It oversaw 22 cases last year in Nashville, and he said he could not foresee Chattanooga having more than that.
“There’s no reason we can’t do it, and I’ve told them that,” Stovall said.