Civil Service is looking at the definition of “risk and safety” manager
Saratoga Springs Civil Service Commission Chair Tim Holmes says that the commission is looking at the definition of risk and safety manager. It may become an item on the commission's agenda.
This is coming after a dust-up between Saratoga Springs Mayor Ron Kim and Commissioner of Accounts Dillon Moran.
The mayor would like to move the risk and safety position into his office, under the direction of the city attorney, but Moran has been fighting this with the aim of keeping the position in the Accounts Department. The arguments during city council meetings started in June and continued at the most recent council meeting Aug. 16.
[Read about the June meeting here.]
Holmes is quick to say that the commission’s role has nothing to do with the person in the job or the politics surrounding it, but with the city’s job description and whether that description comports with the state’s civil service law.
“We are answerable to New York State,” he said in a recent interview, adding that the city council may want a specific department added to the manager’s job description, but it still must pass muster with state law.
The civil service’s role generally is to create a safe work environment that keeps the city's professional staff members out of politics.
We will have more on this soon.
Old hard drives destroyed
The Saratoga Springs City Council approved a $5,162.40 payment to Confidata for destruction of old hard drives. The drives had been removed from computers and were sitting on shelves, Commissioner of Accounts Dillon Moran told the council. With the drives sitting on shelving, they presented a security concern for the city’s information technology staff, the commissioner said.
This might have gone unremarked except that the cost of the destruction was to be $5,000 or less, and did not need council approval at that level. However, the final bill for 458 hard drives, destroyed at $10 apiece, along with the $200 pick-up fee and the $382.40 service recovery fee brought the invoice over the maximum threshold.
During the city council’s discussion, Commissioner of Public Safety James Montagnino was concerned that the city might inadvertently destroy hard drives at a time when the New York State Office of the Attorney General is investigating the Saratoga Springs Police Department. SSPD is under Montagnino's oversight. He said it was his understanding the drives were mostly back-up drives.
Moran said that all of the drives predate the time of concern for the OAG, and that they were at least seven years old, a time period he believed was the minimum required for the city to retain the records on the drives. He did not explain which records were there. He did not respond to a late request for comment.
An April 2022 update of the records retention law shows that the type of data on record is important in determining the length of time needed to retain the records. It lists thousands of types of data.
Three and six years is a common length of retention, but many types of data must be maintained for eight or 10 years, as well. Some records, such as arrests, can be permanent.
For instance, under the Recreation section of the law, “Reports of camp operation and inspection, including facility safety, health and food service reports: RETENTION: 21 years.” Building permits and certificates of occupancy must be retained six years, after the building no longer exists. [Please see the correction below.]
"The State's recommendation is that those records are retained permanently, and we follow that recommendation for any important records, even after a building has been demolished," Patrick Cogan wrote in a clarification email to FoothillsBusinessDaily.com.
Correction: As seen the final paragraph, an error was brought to our attention. We first said records were retained six years, but it is six years after demolition, or permanently in some cases. We apologize for the error.