Employee Separations Create Vacancies in Elk Grove's Finance Department
August 2, 2013 | The departure of two city employees has created vacancies in the City of Elk Grove's finance department. The vac...
https://www.elkgrovenews.net/2013/08/employee-separations-create-vacancies.html
August 2, 2013 |
The departure of two city employees has created vacancies in the City of Elk Grove's finance department.
The departure of two city employees has created vacancies in the City of Elk Grove's finance department.
The vacancies were created with the departure of the city former budget manager Katy Baumbach, who started her city employment in 2005, and finance analyst Salina Cheung. According to city staff, Baunbach's last day with the city was on Wednesday, July 24 while Cheung's was on Friday, July 26.
Both departures were voluntary separations and neither person received severance pay.
The responsibilities of both positions are currently being covered by city staff. The city is currently in the final stages of the selection process to fill Cheung's former position and completion of the interview and selection process for Baumbach's position is expected later this month.
Neither position is currently listed on the city's job opportunities page.
 |
| Former Elk Grove Budget Manager Katy Baumbach. |
Posts
9 comments
Very interesting. The City of Elk Grove pays some of the highest salaries in the region; yet employees aren't long tenured, despite all the perks.
Could it be that the hostile work environment still exists but City Manager Laura Gill is just better about covering it up? Or are members of the Elk Grove City Council now fostering and mirroring her management style, giving employees no where to go but out the door?
After all, the Council just gave Gill a nice raise!
"Voluntary separations???" Sounds a bit fishy that both the manager and the assistant in the finance dept "choose" to leave their well- paying jobs "voluntarily." In this economy, with government entities just starting to recover at a snail's pace...these government workers did not "voluntarily" leave, IMO. More likely, they spoke up about a financial indiscretion (whistle blower) and they were told to quit or be fired. With our city spending money like it's growing on trees, perhaps these two fine employees objected to such things as "no-bid contracts"; million dollar plans that were scraped; raises to bullying managers; or a host of other questionable move by the executive staff. To believe the city that both financial officers left "voluntarily" is ludicrous. Is anyone else buying this story??
Add Baumbach and Cheung to the list, that to the best of my recollections includes, but not limited, to Don Hazen, Susan Burns and William Flores. I can say with a high degree of certainty that Hazen, Burns and Baumbach were is position when Ms. Gill was hired back in, what, August 2008?
Based on my experience, it seems as Ms. Gill is cleaning house of anyone who might voice any dissent and is building her empire. It makes you wonder who is really calling the shots in this city - Ms. Gill or the politicians she controls with her claims of fiscal prowess and faux lilting North Carolina accent (think Andy Griffin)who are to busy sucking on the tits (and other anatomical parts) of developers and labor unions to feed their over-inflated sense of self-importance. I guess these five guys are either to lazy to care or are under Ms. Gill's spell.
God have mercy on the man who doubts what he is sure of.
Oh my gosh, you people are so ridiculous with your whacky conspiracy theories. People leave their jobs VOLUNTARILY all the time! Why that is even a news story is beyond me, but it unfortunately provided you an opportunity to respond with this nonsense. I know for a fact that NEITHER employee was fired. Capt. Benjamin, if those are your "best recollections", you're in sad shape. None of it was correct including Andy Griffith's name, and you should be ashamed of yourself for the filthy anatomy reference. It's easy to sit outside of City Hall and make up false scenarios, but inside of City Hall there are a lot of good, hard working people who deserve more respect than that. And God have mercy on the man who is WRONG about everything he is sure of!
Wow, Capt. - feel pretty strongly, do you?
I have to agree with MOST of what you said though. Yeah, they left "voluntarily," we all know what that means.
It's tough to leave a job when after 10 years you receive "lifetime medical benefits." Hell, I would volunteer to be on a chain gang for 10 years if it gave me free lifetime medical benefits after 10 years.(They also left with no severance pay?)
- Must have been a wonderful place to work. I've heard about the city manager's tirades and screaming at staff. It is no secret that she's a mini-Hitler.
That's ok, though, the council unanimously just gave her a raise!
I'd love to hear the "real story."
Someone, please give us the truth about what's going on at city hall. You can write unanimously. C'mon!
sorry! Make that anonymously, not unanimously. altho that's okay, too!
Something is very amiss here. Didn't Katy win some big budget awards over the past few years?
Steve Detrick and Pat Hume sit on the city's internal audit committee and go over the finances on a regular basis and report out as much. So they should know what happened but you can bet Gill has Hume and Detrick silenced as lambs!
To Anon at 19:23...please read what is being said...no one said they were fired; we all know how government works...resign and you can keep your pension or resign and we'll give you a great reference. There is NO doubt they left due to Ms. Gill's manipulative and dictatorial management style. Also your statement: "but inside of City Hall there are a lot of good, hardworking people" is no doubt true. I have had contact with many such hardworking people over the years. But with Gill in charge those good people become prisoners. They either are conscientious and professional or they strive to please Gill…these two edicts are in direct opposition to each other. You cannot have it both ways. Ms. Gill, and if the previous poster is correct, Hume and Detrick, are overseeing our budget now that we have no budget director or analyst, the situation is ripe for "Bell-like" behavior. Notice all the "consent agenda items" that involve long term financial investment on our part? $404,000 for a no-bid contract for vehicles; Gill's own 5-7% pay raise; no-bid contract for buses. Why all the "no-bid" contracts?? Why are these on the “consent agenda” as opposed to the regular agenda? Are they attempting to hide these irregularities?? Competitive bidding adds an extra layer of scrutiny and checks and balances to the system....but EG dismisses competitive bid procedures at Gill's request. Perhaps our two highest ranking financial people would not/could not/did not fall into line on some of these issues. Something is truly fishy here.
Well, it appears that poster #4 is, to borrow a phrase on another article, is one of the "monkey's in the zoo;" the "zoo" being the City of Elk Grove. Since they "know for a fact," it could easily be deduced that #4 is a city employee....perhaps Hume, Detrick or Gill? Hmmmmm...........
Business as usual in ye 'ol Elk Grove.
Post a Comment