The City of Kosciusko is in the process of revamping employee handbooks across all departments to add or update language concerning epidemic and social media policies, compensatory pay, and other details that the current handbook does not address.
City Clerk Michelle Quesnot said the handbooks were last updated a decade ago, and it was done in-house — not by an outside service. This time around, the city partnered with attorney Todd Butler with Phelps Dunbar LLP to ensure the language properly aligns with state laws. The city should receive its first draft of the new handbooks from Butler in two to three weeks.
“We have to follow state law before we can mandate our own policies,” Quesnot told The Star-Herald.
Quesnot said new policy language regarding social media use will be more specific in identifying the differences between private and public speech. The current social media policy mainly instructs employees not to use social media at work or discuss work-related activities, but the new language should further cover what city employees can and cannot say on social media when at work or off-the-clock.
Compensatory time, unmentioned in the current handbook, will also be addressed along with the longevity pay schedule for tenured employees. Quesnot said the city does not receive many lawsuits, but unemployment cases regularly go to court where the handbook is cited as evidence.
“We do have unemployment cases that go to court pretty regularly,” she said. “People leave and they go file for unemployment, and our handbook is used as evidence in every one of those cases. So, I just want to make sure that we're standing in a good place.”
Concerning epidemic/pandemic guidelines, Quesnot and Mayor Tim Kyle explained that national and state rules have regularly changed, so the city must have its own plan of action for employees in the event of an outbreak.
“The President and the Governor have passed so many different rules for, you know, whether you are getting paid or you are not getting paid, or if your job is going to be there when you get back or not,” said Quesnot.
Kyle added that many of those rules have been discretionary, and the city must make its own guidelines.
“So much of that has been discretionary too, so you really need a policy regarding, ‘This is what we are going to do,’” said Kyle. “The federal government says you're allowed to do this, and the state says we're not participating in that. (The city) has got to say, ‘This is what we are doing.’”
Quesnot added that, “It sure helps to have that policy in place before it happens, instead of trying to hop along and make it up while it's happening in the midst of an emergency.”
Kyle said these changes and additions will make the handbook up to date with policies on the national and state level.
“Over years, things evolved as far as legal, social, and stuff that nobody would have ever thought of years ago,” said Kyle. “So, you have to address those things now because if you don't, you’ll find yourself in the middle of a lawsuit that's really unnecessary just because your handbook doesn't address it.”
Quesnot said once the first draft of the handbooks is received by the city, the city will review it and continue conversations with Butler to ensure everything matches correctly. Then, the Board of Aldermen will vote on it, and if approved, it will likely go into effect shortly thereafter. Quesnot is optimistic that a new handbook will be in place by the start of 2022.
“We'll have a couple of back-and-forths,” said Quesnot. “Hopefully, hopefully, hopefully, we're hoping that by the new year, we'll be able to say, ‘This is our new handbook.’”
