More Responses from Fred Barkes

Here are some responses to a recent comment Bob Freeman made on columbuzz.  As before, Fred Barkes' responses are in bold:

According to law, I cannot lower the pay of the Trustee lower than it is when I take office.

According to the law, best practice, if the Trustee and the Board agree, the salary can be reduced. It is that the Board cannot do it without the Trustee’s agreement.

I complained that his raises in his pay were "way too high."
By his own admission, the Trustee took this job as a part time position. One of his excuses for one of those pay increases was that he made it full time (35 hours a week), thereby justifying an increase.

As my opponent has mentioned or just repeated several times. The job of trustee is 24/7, many hours over just the 35 the Board and I agreed on.

I felt that with a competent staff, I could do it part time (35 hours a week) and keep my concrete testing job.

Good thought, but what about the many morning and lunch time meetings (i.e. 11:30 – 1:30).  I found that part-time just didn’t work well.

As the campaign has proceeded, I find it will be a full time position.
I have said on here recently that I plan to talk to the company I work for and make it a part time job. Most of what I do is done in the mornings.  I will see about cutting my salary in half and working 4 hours a day instead of 8.

I plan to change the office hours from the current 8:30 to 12:00 and 1:00 to 4:00 they are currently open, to 9:00 am to 8:00 pm m-f and half a day on Saturday.

You are talking about a 48 hour work week. There should be two people in the office when it is open. That would be 1 case worker and 1 to work the front desk. Love Chapel is open until 12:00 a.m. and only for food on Saturdays.

People need hours they can come in, including an office open during the lunch hour.
An office of 6 people needs to have everyone at lunch every day at the same time? I don't think so. How ridiculous!

In order to keep the office open during the lunch hour, it could mean that a case worker’s time would be lost also.

Anyway, I can have my hours in the Trustee office can start about noon each day. There will some flexibility in my hours there and at the concrete company.

The Trustee’s time requirements are often  necessary prior to noon.

I assure you of this; I will put in more hours per week than is currently being done. If I win the election, I will be Trustee 24/7.

My opponent implies here that I only work 35 hours a week. He ignores the fact that I do other Township duties evenings and weekends and that often you will find me in the office evenings and weekends. I am available through the Sheriff’s office and many of the service agencies when required. Therefore, I am available 24/7.