Linn supervisors back off move to take 6 employees from Auditor Miller

CEDAR RAPIDS - Neither side will win it all in the latest bitter battle between the Linn County Board of Supervisors and Linn County Auditor Joel Miller over six of Miller's remaining 19 employees.

At the end of a lengthy debate on Tuesday, Supervisors John Harris, Brent Oleson and Ben Rogers each said that Miller will need to keep some of the six employees in question who now perform GIS or Geographic Information Systems work as part of their job in the auditor's office.

The supervisors had been planning to move all six to a new GIS entity under their purview in a move not unlike the one in March when the supervisors moved 30 employees in facilities maintenance from Miller's authority to theirs.

The changes come in the midst of an ongoing dispute between the supervisors and Miller over his duties and over the amount of autonomy an elected auditor has from the elected county supervisors.

At Tuesday's meeting between the supervisors and the county's department heads, Oleson, Rogers and Harris - Supervisors Linda Langston and Lu Barron were away - made it known that they wanted to move all six county employees with GIS duties to their oversight and from Miller's.

The three initially had rejected Miller's claim that much of the work that most of the six perform involves real estate transactions, which is one of the central roles of his office, he explained.

In the end, Miller called five of the six employees forward to introduce themselves to supervisors and have them explain their duties themselves.

Four of the five estimated that 80 percent or more of their duties involve personal interaction with property owners and other customers and with the paperwork that is involved with property transactions, development plans and deeds. The rest of the time they said they perform GIS duties. A fifth employee was a GIS system administrator who sounded as if most of his duties involve the GIS system.

Stacey Law, a 27-year county employee with a title of GIS specialist, told the supervisors that she was "disappointed" that they had planned to move hers and five other jobs when "you don't know what we do," she said. Most of the work involves real estate duties, not GIS work, she said.

Gary Jarvis, assistant Linn County Attorney and legal adviser to the county, initially said he did not think there was any legal problem with moving the employees from Miller's purview to the supervisors'.

Miller, though, brought his own attorney, Peter Riley of Cedar Rapids, and Riley argued that Miller has duties spelled out in state law that require him to approve property plats, certify real estate deeds and ensure the legality of real estate transactions. Moving the six employees would prevent him from supervising the employees who perform those duties, Riley said.

"That is a legal issue," he said.

Jarvis then suggested to the supervisors that the answer might not be "all or nothing." Some of the six employees might need to stay under Miller's oversight, some not, he said.

After the meeting, Supervisor Harris, the board's chairman, said that all six GIS employees may see a "revamp" of their current job duties, with some staying with Miller and some moving to a new GIS entity.

Supervisor Oleson, who said he wants to move the GIS function out of Miller's office to make it more available to the public and to other county departments, agreed. He said he wants to keep some of the six employees in place so the move doesn't "disturb" the core real estate function that Miller has the statutory duty to perform.

"It's not a snatch-and-grab," Supervisor Rogers insisted. He said the supervisors will review how other metro counties in Iowa split up the GIS and real estate duties.

Miller accused the supervisors of having a "one-way conversation" with themselves, excluding him and using county employees "as pawns" in the supervisors' dispute with him.

The dispute also has made its way to court, where the supervisors won one round of litigation only to have the Iowa Legislature and the governor modify state law to embrace one of Miller's central contentions - that county auditors in Iowa can audit the transactions of the county.

Miller considers himself a taxpayer watchdog, but the majority of supervisors have not supported his efforts to review their spending.

On Tuesday, the three supervisors also said they will make Miller report his expected budget spending every month, though other elected officials and departments must make such a report every six months.

Oleson said Miller had "broken" the trust between the supervisors and him when he hired an outside consultant without their approval, gave one of his deputies a bonus against county policy and made other decisions with a "complete disregard" for the supervisors.

Miller said he had violated no law or county policy, and said he was being punished over differences of opinion.

Last week, he said the supervisors were retaliating against him because of the new law to let county auditors audit, though Oleson and Rogers on Tuesday said that there plans to move GIS duties and to make Miller report on his monthly spending came before the governor signed last week's new law.