By MIKE COURSON
Great Bend Post
Barton County wants to keep its employees happy. The Employee Relations Committee that handled business on that front recently dissolved, and County Administrator Matt Patzner is looking for new ways to engage employees. Wednesday morning, he asked the Barton County Commission for $10,000 as part of an Employee Engagement Committee.
"The county has traditionally provided certain funding to source employee engagement," he said. "Typical practices have included a summer picnic, holiday party, beef bundles, jackets, and retirement gifts. The Employee Relations Committee being responsible for these and other activities has been dissolved. It's suggested the commission transfers $10,000 to be used for employee engagement."
Human Resource Director Brenda Kaiser will now be tasked with forming the new committee with the goal of finding employees focused on morale, community service, and input on benefits and policies. Patzner said it is important to continue hearing from employees, but unlike the previous committee, he wants the Employee Engagement Committee to have active volunteers.
"That's the biggest thing we wanted to move away from is seeing this as some sort of burden or obligation," he told commissioners. "I think an active want to participate in this is going to be key to it being successful."
Any regularly-planned items, like beef bundles for Christmas, would come from the general fund and not the $10,000 allocated to the employee relations fund. None of the $10,000 approved Wednesday is earmarked, and any requests to use the new funds must be approved by the commission. Step one, Patzner said, was merely getting approval and finding five employees who want to serve on the committee. Interested county employees can contact Kaiser for more information or to apply.
"I think it will be exciting to get five excited people that work at Barton County that think it's a great place to spread their enthusiasm to all the other employees," said Commissioner Tricia Schlessiger. "It's a great place to work."