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* Last week…
A retired state employee who worked at the Illinois Department of Public Health for 33 years won a state deal worth up to $80,000 to work part-time as an outside consultant after his former co-workers steered the contract to him, according to a report published by the Office of the Executive Inspector General.
State records show Don Williams, who retired from IDPH in mid-2017, received $36,040 in contract payments while simultaneously collecting his state pension and Social Security retirement benefits.
In a letter dated August 23rd, 2019, IDPH responded to the OEIG, and said it had voided the contract after someone filed a complaint, alleging a conflict of interest. […]
Governor Pritzker’s office said it had discussed the issue with the former HFSRB chairman before the board met to decide on an appropriate course of action. Pritzker’s government lawyer Ann Spillane said the Governor’s Office will “review the State’s procurement system” in response to this episode.
* Also…
The Office of Executive Inspector General’s said Friday a contract for data services was too narrowly drawn to favor awarding it to a retired state worker.
However, the office also said it could not pinpoint blame for the way the contract terms were developed because multiple people were involved in the process.
* Hannah Meisel gets to the bottom of it…
Those responsible for the contract believed Williams was the only person who knew how to use the Certificate of Need database, which is used by both IDPH and the health facilities board to handle incoming applications, calculate fees and draft reports.
Williams told investigators that the only two other employees who ever used the database retired, and he was “the only one who has worked on the database since the mid-1980s,” according to the report. Williams also estimated it would take “three to four months” to train someone to use the database. […]
“[Health Facilities and Services Review Board Administrator Courtney Avery] also told investigators she estimated training a new person to use the database would have taken three months. […]
IDPH’s former Deputy Director Bill Dart told investigators that Williams’ retirement from the agency in 2017 “caught IDPH off guard, and that to keep things flowing smoothly,” the agency agreed to rehire Williams on a 75-day appointment, which was followed by a subsequent 75-day appointment in 2018.
posted by Rich Miller
Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:07 am
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===A retired state employee who worked at the Illinois Department of Public Health for 33 years won a state deal worth up to $80,000 to work part-time as an outside consultant after his former co-workers steered the contract to him, according to a report published by the Office of the Executive Inspector General.===
Doesn’t thinks basically describe every single 75 day contract the state does with recently retired employees ever?
Comment by Candy Dogood Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:16 am
This is done all the time at all agencies. People retire and immediately get a 75 day contract that is often renewed. People that retired years ago are still working via contracts and double dipping. Right or wrong?
Comment by El Conquistador Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:16 am
Caught off guard by the retirement of a 30+ year employee? OK…
Comment by Ron Burgundy Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:23 am
Even actors in community theater have understudies for the main/essential parts. If it is true Williams is “the only one who knows how to do it” that is a problem of management.
Comment by Responsa Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:24 am
Often the most knowlegable and skilled person is the one who has done that work for the last 30-40 years. Happens in the Business world all the time.
Comment by Anonymous Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:25 am
I believe you can only earn $17,640 if claiming social security benefits unless you have reached your full retirement age. IDPH was caught off guard. Give me a break. We run reports all the time showing who is eligible to retire and plan accordingly.
Comment by pool boy Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:25 am
===Right or wrong?===
Right. It’s very difficult and sometimes impossible to replace institutional knowledge when someone retires. Daily operational needs continue and the State’s hiring process can be painfully slow.
Comment by Cubs in '16 Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:26 am
==We run reports all the time showing who is eligible to retire and plan accordingly.==
Good for you. It must be nice to work in a perfect world where you can hire people ahead of time to train. I’m sure a lot of state agencies would love to know how that is done.
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:27 am
Why exactly was it an issue to write a request for services that specifically listed experience on the program you would like that person or vendor to work on?
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:29 am
If you put people without management training who don’t care about management, who don’t want to manage, into management roles, this is what you get.
management isn’t a place where people with close springfield network connections can get a nice payday and go to meetings all day.
management requires a lot of work, or at least it is supposed to. The managers in this situation should be fired or demoted (including agency personnel managers and personnel at CMS). If you start holding people accountable, things will change.
Comment by Merica Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:30 am
I can’t speak to the legality of the ‘steering of the contract’, but retirees are brought back on contract at agencies a lot. Whether it’s a 75 day contract or a personal services contract, it’s a good deal for both sides. The agency gets to slowly deal with the loss of knowledge, and the retiree gets to transition into retirement.
With the reduction in headcount over the last several years, there is not staff available to quickly transition all that knowledge from overbooked people to new people who are also overbooked. There isn’t always a great deal of time between the announcement and the retirement date to even hire a new person.
As to tne ‘double dipping’, it’s not. The pension and retirement benefits are for the years of service that a person put in as an employee. That is set at the retirement date. Part time contract work doesn’t add to years of service and that is your pay for what you do now. So I don’t see it as double dipping. Payment for two different times of service.
Comment by thoughts matter Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:35 am
Right now where I work there are people who are in their mid sixties doing jobs that no one else has training in. We will be in rough shape should these people decide to retire.
Comment by 17% Solution Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:35 am
This occurs regularly at the state because of low head count, short staffed teams, and the limitations on hiring from the highest levels. It is basically standard operating procedure.
Comment by Union Dues Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:35 am
I agree it happens all the time.
The 75 day contract arrangement is actually a good deal for the State. It fixes the rate at the same hourly equivalent the State was previously paying … and it limits the amount of annual expenditure. Plus it is, literally, 75 working days whether you work and are paid for 1 hour a day or 8 hours a day. The other advantage of the 75 day arrangement is it mostly bypasses all the bidding of the procurement process.
The RFI / RFP / RFQ process allows for up to unlimited hours and unlimited rate, so the State can end up paying more than under a 75 day.
As to specifying particular knowledge, that is common. Often the former employee is more knowledgeable and can do the work quicker than someone who does not know the system.
Full disclosure: I worked a number of times under the 75 day on special projects. And the last time I worked the agency insisted on doing an RFP, which ended up costing them more than the 75 day would have. I tried to talk then into doing a 75 day but they wouldn’t. The State lost too much institutional knowledge, including how to do procurements.
Comment by RNUG Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:52 am
Pool boy -= We run reports all the time showing who is eligible to retire and plan accordingly.=
Please translate for me. What exactly do you mean when you say plan accordingly? How much of that planning is actually be behaving in a manner that could be considered age discrimination against a person old enough to retire? Are you forgoing raises/ promotions to them? Are you giving them ‘assistants’ and asking them how long they are going to continue to work?
Comment by thoughts matter Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:52 am
It’s weird that Magerl reached out to Williams and helped him write his resume to match the job description. As I understand it, it’s usually the other way round in these types of scenarios, where you write the description to match the job or the employee’s skills (which is obviously before the contract gets posted).
Comment by Perrid Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:57 am
75 Day contracts are also often only at 80% of what the individual was making when they retired, meaning it’s a savings over keeping the retiree employed as well.
Comment by CharlieKratos Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:09 am
- Merica - Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 10:30 am:
===If you put people without management training who===
I believe this is specifically the problem across the board in every agency. Management training, if any occurs, usually consists of tasks, and rather than any effort to develop a broad understanding of public administration, management best practices, et al, any other training is focused on things like how to issue discipline, etc.
Other major factors that impact who becomes management at state agencies could be best addressed with better training which could cause existing managers to be aware of such things as organizational cultures, that it’s a good idea to try to create one rather than just having whatever springs up, and just in general avoiding toxic and abusive management practices.
The lack of this development is likely due to struggles with funding, but the lack of this development almost certainly causes a less effective and less efficient agency prone for public embarrassment, like having a decades old database and not having bothered to train, coach, or develop any employees on the database in the last couple of decades.
Comment by Candy Dogood Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:12 am
Can’t decide if we’re making a mountain out of a molehill or an ant hill, but if the worst thing that happened at the Illinois Department of Public Health last year was they hired a guy to do a job that he was surely the most qualified to do, he actually showed up for work and did the job, and then we paid him $36K which he did not immediately split with his boss or a state legislator….that was a pretty good year.
Oh yeah, ICYMI the press through a get-out-of—jail party last week for a triple convict ex-governor.
Comment by Juvenal Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:13 am
— when you say plan accordingly? —
Cross training perhaps? And when someone gets fired or leaves abruptly, do you hire them back? No, but the job gets done until someone is hired and trained. This is absolutely double dipping because you are getting paid twice for the same job.
Comment by MeatandTaters Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:14 am
“thoughts matter” - cross training. No one should be indispensable.
Comment by pool boy Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:15 am
It’s clear to me that some of you have absolutely no clue when it comes to the world of hiring in the state. I don’t know of an agency who wouldn’t love to engage in cross training. But that requires someone to cross train. This is what happens when you run an organization without sufficient resources needed to complete the tasks you are required to complete.
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:18 am
Like RNUG said, 75 day contracts can be cost-effective for the State.
Managers can see a problem coming and still have no ability to prevent it. I wanted to upgrade a system while the person who wrote it was still on staff. Never got the funds. I changed jobs and he died of a heart attack.
Comment by Last Bull Moose Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:20 am
Failure to plan is planing to fail, knowledge is power
Comment by Rabid Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:21 am
I do think it’s also important to bring up the fact that the Department of Innovation and Technology was supposed to address some of these types of issues. A pool of resources was being created by creating this agency and those resources were supposed to be available to all agencies. That has not happened. Agencies still contract out for information technology services. All the time.
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:21 am
== It’s weird that Magerl reached out to Williams and helped him write his resume to match the job description. ==
Like I said, lack of institutional knowledge on how to run the system
Comment by RNUG Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:32 am
== It’s clear to me that some of you have absolutely no clue when it comes to the world of hiring in the state. ==
Real life example … everyone knew there was going to be a major staffing loss with the proposed 2002 ERI. The section I worked in wanted to hire people 6 months in advance to crosstrain but there was no open headcount. The hiring finally got done 9 to 12 months after all the ERI employees had retired. So a year or two later, most of us were day on 75 day trying to get the new hires up to speed …
Comment by RNUG Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:41 am
The retirees that are getting contracts aren’t doing the type of jobs that you can cross-train someone for in a day or two or twenty. Even if you had all day every day to cross train ( meaning you didn’t have actual work to do). A good percentage of these contracts are for COBOL programmers. You can’t hire just anyone for these jobs. Colleges don’t teach this stuff. Hiring a college graduate just means they can be trained… if they want to. Many of them don’t want to do the mainframe programming because it’s not flashy. They don’t want to get paid beginners wages either, so they often turn down the job. Then once you do get them up to speed on general mainframe languages, you have to teach them what the agency actually does. Something else a lot of them think they shouldn’t need to know to program.
It can take anywhere between one to three years to get a programmer really capable of handling a good sized system on their own.
Comment by thoughts matter Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:45 am
The jobs that get contracts aren’t the type of jobs you can cross train for in a few days, or even weeks. They are often COBOL programmer/ analyst positions. They don’t teach COBOL or even mainframe in any colleges any more. You have to train a college graduate from scratch in the languages, what the agency is trying to accomplish and so forth. It can take up to 3 YEARS to get a programmer able to maintain a good dude’s system on their own. That’s once you can get them hired and if they will stay since they start at low wages and don’t get any big raises.
Comment by thoughts matter Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:51 am
The 75-day PSC is a horrible policy. Something that was originally created for an emergency situation is now used as standard practice. The problem with it being standard practice is that every state employee is eligible to retire and usually retires before they are physically, mentally, and financially ready to retire (they still have working years left). So now, because it’s standard practice, everyone tries to make them themselves “indispensable” in the way they handle their job functions. This incentivizes people to not cross-train their colleagues, and creates emergency situations when people get sick or ill. it leads to menial tasks being over compensated which causes a demoralized state workforce and it blocks younger cheaper new employees from being hired.
If you want the state government to function and to help the citizens. More managerial jobs need to be transferred to the Chicago area where there is a larger population of management experienced candidates. An online grad degree, or a degree from UIS, w/o actual management experience, doesn’t cut it.
Comment by Merica Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:52 am
Good enough for government work applies to the management in the Illinois Department of Public Health. Any supervisor worth her/his salt knows that having an “indispensable” employee is a bad thing.
Comment by Donnie Elgin Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:52 am
Sorry .. good sized system. Small phone screen- big fingers.
Comment by thoughts matter Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:52 am
==More managerial jobs need to be transferred to the Chicago area==
That’s not arrogant at all. On behalf of everyone in Springfield - bite us.
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 12:23 pm
==More managerial jobs need to be transferred to the Chicago area==
Also, there is nothing stopping anyone from Chicago from applying for these jobs. They are free to move to Springfield - you know - where the people they are going to supervise are most likely to be if it’s a central office job.
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 12:25 pm
==Any supervisor worth her/his salt knows that having an “indispensable” employee is a bad thing.==
Of course they do. But you and others apparently just aren’t geting it. This issue is a prime example of the failure of state hiring practices and not necessarily of the manager.
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 12:26 pm
Marika that is just bull they have been doing that since Blago was in office and they have hired sub standard managers because good ones can make double in private industry. There are many good candidates in and around Springfield but most don’t want those jobs because they would be stuck at the salary they tool the job fee or years. Just not worth it.
Comment by Big D Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 12:37 pm
This sounds like people struggling to make things work in a system which has been cut to the brink of dysfunction. Yet another reason to adequately fund our government by passing the graduated income tax. Relentless tax cuts haven’t work, let’s try paying enough people enough money to do the job.
Comment by Froganon Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 1:05 pm
Merica, that actually violates a law passed because Springfield IS the state Capitol, and its employees and functions should be accomplished here.
Comment by depressed in politics Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 1:15 pm
I accidentally deleted RNUG’s post. Sorry.
Comment by Rich Miller Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 1:16 pm
I would also like to point out that the example cited in the complaint was only published because a complaint was filed, and truthfully, this is the most innocuous example of this practice that i have seen. Typically,
- The state employee gives management 1-2 years prior notice of their retirement;
- The state employee does not have job duties or knowledge that is difficult to replicate;
- agency fails to hire or train an internal replacement (by splitting job functions between multiple people) for two years;
- Employee retires, is offered a PSC, makes way more than $80k (several PSC’s at CMS we’re making over $200k),
- the PSC ends and the job duties are done by a manpower temp at $15/hr, or no one fills the position and the job duties are just ignored and neglected forever and no one knows why there was a PSC in the first place
Comment by Merica Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 1:56 pm
There are two reasons that the whole ‘cross-training’ theory or the ‘anticipate the retirement’ theory fall apart. First, these are union jobs. If someone is the only one doing a particular task, you can’t just train someone else to do it and then move that person into the old spot. Vacancies are filled by seniority, and the person with seniority and who actually wants the job won’t be known until after the retiree leaves. And heaven help you if no one wants it, because then the new hire will be filled in compliance with veteran’s preference rules, meaning if the candidate meets the minimum qualifications (e.g., a BA), then NO requirement for actual skill or knowledge in the area can be required. Yes, an arts major can claim a computer programming job.
Second, you can’t just hire the new person and allow for several months of overlap for training. Because of headcount limitations and budget limitations, it is SOP at IDPH and other agencies to have to wait until the person leaves to have the headcount available to fill the old position. Plus, since there is no budget for paying out accumulated benefits, you often have to leave the old position empty for a month or two to harvest the funds to pay the departing employee’s accumulated vacation, etc.
As others have said, the whole system is designed to NOT facilitate knowledge transfer.
Comment by Rasselas Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 2:40 pm
A little lesson in governmental budget magic is needed here. Ideally, my place of employment (large gov.) won’t hire until position is vacant. In reality, the position is left vacant by choice for a fair while beyond this point so that the unused salary remains in the pot to divvy out to current employees. You see, raises given to the masses haven’t exceeded COLA in years. A good manager knows how to time this just right coinciding with the new hire coming on board near the end of the budget year. A really good manager can bump the new hire’s salary to a competitive level without it having much impact on the current budget while boosting the salary base for the following year’s budget. See how that works!
Now, no one is available to train the new hire since the incumbent is long gone so the usual result is that the new hire gets frustrated and is less productive, staff gets angry at the higher paid new hire that can’t do their job, etc. What happens next? A general outcry among the troops to hire old Joe back to fix the problem. The good manager hires old Joe back as a contractor at his old hourly rate plus 35% to cover his taxes and such. Since it’s not payroll costs, no one seems to mind.
Oh yea, I forgot to add this. Years of patching legacy systems instead of replacing them have resulted in people like Old Joe being the only ones around who can keep them running. Further, good luck if you’re a government in hiring any competent IT people under the age of 40 in today’s market. The lousy pay, mandatory pension contributions and lack of any perks whatsoever compared to private sector put us at a significant disadvantage. It helped way back when you could offer that pension pot of gold after 35 years to prospective employees. Not the case anymore.
Comment by Reality bites Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 2:41 pm
Merica
All I can say is that you don’t have the first clue as to what you are talking about and the reason I know that is that your first point is simply wrong in most cases that I’m aware of.
Where exactly are these places where someone is giving 1 to 2 years notice of retirement. I can tell you that frequently you are lucky if you get 2 months notice.
And you still cannot grasp how the state hiring processes work becasue if you did you wouldn’t continue to make the comments you are making. You are simply wrong as wrong can be.
Comment by Demoralized Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 2:43 pm
Reminder to us all- Don’t feed the troll.
Comment by thoughts matter Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 2:44 pm
== I accidentally deleted RNUG’s post. Sorry. ==
No problem. Not sure which one you got …
Comment by RNUG Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 3:14 pm
== Where exactly are these places where someone is giving 1 to 2 years notice of retirement. ==
Admittedly it was 20 years ago, but the division I worked in at CMS did keep track of the people coming up on the typical 30 and 35 year srrvice anniversaries and/or age 55 and 60 points that people tended to retire on. Didn’t always help with cross-training but sometimes specific duties could be transferred for the PSA (they were non-union then) and SPSA staff so there was some continuity.
In addition, for the older employees, there is a series of retirement countdown seminars that SERS offers at the 10 year, 5 year, and less marks. These seminars are during the normal work day, and are considered a normal work day for the employee. Since you have to schedule these seminars through your agency, management should have a good idea of the staff considering retirement and the likely timeframe.
The system as set up can’t really deal with it, but normally they should know what is coming. The exception is something like the 2002 ERI that kind of came out of left field … but even there SERS and CMS Personnel worked up lists of eligible people and distributed said lists to all the agencies. That started with a 6 month window, July to December, but a lot of people waited to decide until after the November election results … so that made it harder to deal with.
Comment by RNUG Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 3:34 pm
@- thoughts matter - Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 11:51 am:
===That’s once you can get them hired and if they will stay since they start at low wages and don’t get any big raises.===
Also, the tier 2 pensions don’t help.
Comment by DuPage Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 3:47 pm
Demoralized - when i said “one or two years notice” I didn’t mean that employees are sending their HR departments a written notice saying they would retire on December 31, 2022. What i meant was employees are verbally telling their colleagues and supervisors their plans to retire well in advance and everyone knows about these plans. From what i’ve seen in the past 5 years, people are talking about their retirement date 1-2 years before they actually pull the trigger and most of the time sticking to their plan.
I am aware of some agencies refusing to hire until a position is “vacant,” and the reasons for that with headcount, but in my
opinion that is a policy born out of the failure to properly staff agency and CMS personnel/HR, and not an actual legal or fiscal requirement.
Furthermore, job descriptions are intentionally vague, i’ve never seen a situation where only one person had in their job description the duty to compete a task. most state employees are doing tasks outside of their job description for some part of the day.
Look, I think the PSC is a bad policy and i’ve listed
many reasons above for that opinion. Apparently having that opinion makes me a “troll.”
Comment by Merica Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 4:52 pm
OK. I remembered the post Rich accidently got.
In response to people saying to hire management in Chicago, it pointed out that management in Springfield would have a lower cost of living than in Chicago and not have a lot of the Chicago hassles like commuting and high parking costs.
Comment by RNUG Monday, Feb 24, 20 @ 6:18 pm