Children Services levy in doubt
Higgins, Candice Brooks. Cincinnati Post, March 1, 2007, pg. A2.
Voter support for a levy renewal this year for Butler County Children Services already was questionable after foster child Marcus Fiesel's death.
But county commissioners said Wednesday the agency's board added another strike against the levy's passage when it awarded the departing director a $110,000 consulting contract."Stunned, disappointed, and now angry" was how county Commission President Gregory Jolivette described his emotions in a letter to the board Wednesday after learning of the contract he called "unwarranted and unprecedented." His letter asked the board to reconsider its decision.
"This action by the board doesn't send the right message that we want to send to the public about restoring confidence in the agency," Jolivette said.
County Commissioners Michael Fox and Charles Furmon concurred with Jolivette's disappointment and frustration.
The Children Services Board unanimously approved the agreement Tuesday that will keep Executive Director Jann Heffner on its payroll for nearly 15 months beyond the effective date of her resignation. On Feb. 16, she announced her plans to step down, saying she had become a target of criticism since Marcus' death and a distraction from the agency's progress.
The 3-year-old boy died in August after his foster parents, Liz and David Carroll, left him wrapped in a blanket for two days in their Union Township home while they attended a family reunion in Northern Kentucky. Both are beginning long prison terms after being convicted of murder and other charges in the past week.
Heffner will depart her position April 15, but will stay on as a consultant as she continues to collect on a $125,000 annual salary until June 30, the board said Tuesday night. Beginning July 1, the new one-year consulting contract will pay Heffner $110,000 as she assists with the transition of a new director.
"The letter from Commissioner Jolivette seems reactionary and does not take into consideration the real intent of the board," the board's chairman, the Rev. Johnny Wade Sloan, said in a prepared statement.
Sloan said Heffner is assigned to several specific projects -- some yet to be determined -- and her new contract is "not a severance agreement nor just a consulting agreement."
Tuesday night -- at the same meeting the contract was approved -- the board decided to place a 2-mill renewal levy on the Nov. 6 ballot. The existing levy costs taxpayers $56.74 for every $100,000 of home value and a renewal would not tack on new taxes. More than $15 million in tax income -- about 60 percent of the agency's budget -- is on the line as an existing 2-mill levy is set to expire Dec. 31.
"It's difficult to get any kind of levy passed, but hopefully the citizens will see that this is for the children and see past this," Furmon said.
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