HR proposes look‑back FMLA tracking, hiring vacation incentive and small vacation‑retention change

Human resources staff presented several proposed benefits and leave-policy updates. Key changes include moving family medical leave eligibility tracking from a forward-counting calendar to a rolling 12‑month look‑back (aligning with common practice), allowing administrative officers to grant up to 40 hours of "incentive" vacation to newly hired candidates without direct commissioner approval to streamline recruitment, and letting employees on FMLA keep up to 40 hours of vacation and 24 hours of personal preference time to use after leave.

Commissioners asked about the budgetary treatment of leave for grant-funded positions and the county's termination (term) pool used to cover leave liabilities. One commissioner said that unpaid or unbillable leave can be problematic for reimbursed contracts and asked staff to analyze whether expanding the term pool (for example, from 2% to 3%) would be allowable on grant budgets. HR and legal staff said they would review grant rules and present options.