By Robert Williams

Editor

Any employee who has gone through a performance evaluation would not have recognized what was termed an evaluation of Becker County Administrator Pat Oman on Tuesday, Dec. 19, at the latest meeting of the Board of Commissioners in Detroit Lakes.

The “evaluation” was more of a mud-slinging contest between commissioners.

Commissioner Erica Jepson pushed to move the annual evaluation of Oman to a later date, or until the board is notified of Oman’s denial or acceptance of a job offer in Fort Meade, Fla.

“The only reason he has a job offer is because they’re trying to fire him here,” said Commissioner Richard Vareberg. “That’s the concern here. If you’re going to lose your job or are in a constant fear of losing your job, you eventually start looking for jobs. I happen to know he would like to keep his job, but he’s just afraid he’s going to get railroaded out of here. That’s the way it appears. I’d say go ahead and do your evaluation and let’s see what you think of him. My hope is we get to keep him. He’s very intelligent.”

Commissioner John Okeson agreed that the evaluation should stay on schedule to be held in a closed session at the conclusion of the commissioners’ meeting. Oman opted to have the meeting held publicly.

The meeting was monitored by Labor Attorney Ann Goering via video conferencing.

Chairman Barry Nelson began the meeting noting he wanted to hear from the rest of the board before beginning with positive words for Oman.

“Pat has done a lot of things well,” Nelson said. “There are times when I really appreciate his work on a lot of the projects. I have concerns in other areas. I think everyone has their strengths and weaknesses in job performances.”

Vareberg, who has defended Oman vehemently in the recent past, made his opening remarks that were more an evaluation of the county than its administrator.

“When I first became a commissioner here, I knew a lot of the employees here because I was in and out of this courthouse, mostly for permits, but for a lot of different reasons, and I got a lot of complaints from those employees about the way this place was being run,” Vareberg said. “I actually found out that a lot of trouble was coming from just a small amount of employees just starting trouble, and nobody was doing anything about it.”

Vareberg turned toward the point of meeting stating that over time he brought up employees to Oman and Oman’s response was, “I’m going to do my best to make them a good employee.”

Vareberg also quoted Oman as saying if he can’t make that employee a good employee, he will do his best to send that employee down the road.

“I’ve watched him do that; I’ve watched him stand up to commissioners who were not being good to our employees,” Vareberg said. “He’s quite a man. He’s a very strong man and he’s quite a leader. I’ve watched him stand right up and do the right thing.”

Vareberg continued by giving Oman credit for sniffing out toxic employees and getting rid of them, thereby improving the overall work environment at the county.

“He has an insight,” Vareberg said. “I want to say, thank you, Pat. You’ve made my job easier. You’ve been very accessible.”

Nelson noted an area of improvement for Oman is communication and the inclusion of all commissioners, stating that he, Nelson, had felt excluded in many cases.

“I’ve felt that documents and information are not always readily available prior to discussion,” Nelson said.

The board chair noted a number of meetings where decisions were difficult to make because of not having information beforehand to review prior to meetings where those decisions needed to be made.

“Even if you don’t agree, I think there are ways to make a better team,” said Nelson. “Obviously, we’re not working as a good team right now at the board level. I think improvements could be made on the department head level on their ongoing strategies.”

Nelson summed up by acknowledging that Oman has done a lot of things better, but could improve in other areas.

Jepson agreed with the communication problems between all board members, centering her argument on how Oman should be on the front line of relaying information from department heads to the commissioners.

Jepson also took umbrage with Vareberg’s statements about employees and highlighted an increase in human resources spending of approximately $70,000 per year, claiming that increase is in direct relation to the relationship with employees.

“We have to have a good relationship with our unions,” Jepson said.

“Our union is terrible,” said Vareberg.

Jepson disagreed and moved on to citing delays with the compensation and classification study that has been discussed at length the past few months are in direct correlation with a failing relationship between county administration and its employees.

“Employee retention saves us money,” Jepson said. “If we continue to have a revolving door of employees it costs us money. Having a good administrator that can help with a functioning board is imperative with keeping employees and that is where we’re struggling right now.”

Commissioner John Okeson began his comments with the question of if the county is better with the current administrator on board or not.

“I think Becker County, overall, with some issues here and there, is a better place right now and I’ve been here 14 years here as commissioner and prior to that I had 43 years working with the county and I’ve grown with the issues,” said Okeson. “Since Pat has been here we’ve advanced on our policy updates, which hasn’t been done for years. We’re starting exit interviews which have never been done with employees that are leaving.”

Okeson continued citing things that have improved under Oman including employee reviews and an upgraded IT system.

Okeson countered Jepson stating the communication is a two-way street, while agreeing with Nelson that getting information on time for meetings is imperative.

Commissioner David Meyer cited Oman’s knowledge of state statutes as a big plus, but seconded Jepson’s claim that Oman had wanted to meet monthly with the new commissioners, but after an initial meeting in January never met again with either Jepson or Meyer.

Meyer echoed Jepson’s communication complaints and the adverse effects that lack of communication has on making sound decisions.

Vareberg accused Nelson, Meyer and Jepson of having three votes to get rid of Oman from the beginning of the year. He stood up from his chair and cited an employee complaint about a fellow commissioner and illegalities, citing an investigation that is in process.

“There is a lot of illegal stuff going on here and the problem is you left your fingerprints all over it; there’s a trail for you to follow and when these people get done with this investigation, there’s going to be some answers here,” Vareberg said. “To sit here and say things that are not true doesn’t work. It’s like I said. They’ve been threatening to fire this man for a year, you have Barry, and the problem is if you’re going to break the open meeting law, do it with somebody who doesn’t tell everybody.”

“Well, it’s beginning to be an attack on myself,” said Nelson.

“Well, you’re the guy starting all the trouble,” Vareberg said.

Okeson tried to bring some semblance of calm to the meeting. Goering also tried to steer the meeting to an actual evaluation rather than rehashing personal grievances.

Vareberg accused Jepson, Meyer and Nelson of meeting illegally in private to discuss Oman’s firing and accused Goering of not doing a full investigation into commissioners’ actions against Oman.

Goering was asked for direction for the remainder of the evaluation. She noted that the board is obviously split in regards to Oman and explained any stipulations that were in play, given the meeting was open.

Vareberg and Jepson began to argue after Vareberg stated no decision on Oman’s status should be made until after the investigation into alleged mistreatment of Oman.

Goering again tried to bring the meeting back on point in that an evaluation should be done based on the performance of the administrator, not somebody else’s conduct. She also cut off Vareberg from more conversations about separate issues.

“We’re so fractured right now and I think this is part of the problem,” said Nelson. “I think Pat is part of the problem.”

Oman did not speak during the conversation, but heard plenty to think about while mulling his job offer and a relocation to Florida. The board gave him the holidays to do so.

Okeson made a motion, seconded by Vareberg, to table any further discussion or a decision until the January commissioners’ meeting.