Published: May 16, 2008 11:12 pm            

Morale low among city employees

Uncertainty about potential job cuts at the city of Dalton’s Public Works Department has some employees there on edge. And it may be trickling down to other city departments.

During the Public Works Committee meeting on Friday, councilman Dick Lowrey asked public works director Benny Dunn the state of morale at his road department as city officials and the Whitfield County Board of Commissioners consider merging their road departments. Dunn said many of the employees are nervous about losing their jobs, while the uncertainty of who may lose their job is beginning to cause problems. He called several employees into his office last week because tensions were running high.

“It’s not just at public works,” Dunn said. “It’s everywhere.”

One city public works employee at the meeting said morale is “terrible.” Several employees have asked Dunn if their names are on a list of those who will lose their jobs. Dunn said no such lists exist, but said the workers’ anxiety illustrates real concerns.

“I keep telling my guys just to keep up the same good work they’ve been doing,” Dunn said.

Mayor David Pennington, who is leading the charge to merge the city and county road departments, said those fears are expected. But Pennington, who did not attend the meeting, said department managers should be able to address the concerns of each employee. He also hopes employees would be motivated to work harder and more efficiently.

“When you’re talking about significant change in your department, business, whatever, it’s going to obviously have an impact on morale just like it is here with the carpet industry with the layoffs and things like that,” Pennington said. “It’s not an unusual thing.”

Earlier this month, council members passed a resolution calling for the two road departments to be merged. County commissioners passed a stripped-down resolution calling for a third party to examine the proposal. Under the original plan, the county would be responsible for maintaining roads.

When council members began discussing the plan, they said 25 to 30 city public works employees could lose their jobs. The cuts under the revised plan could be less, but the exact amount is not known. City and county officials are also considering merging the building inspector’s offices.

“We think it’s good progress, but we also thought on the resolution that we passed that the county said they were going to pass, we thought we were making good progress, too,” Pennington said. “So we hope we’re going to have a better outcome with the building inspector than we did with the road departments at the moment.”

If the building inspector’s offices are combined, Pennington said there wouldn’t be cuts “to begin with.” He also does not know of any private contractors that provide those services.

“Last I heard is they’re just going to combine the two departments under one roof and have a one-stop shop,” Pennington said.

Exactly where the two departments would be housed has not been determined.

        

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