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Four years later: A county reformed Faith in government has been restored — despite squabbles By JAY MILLER jmiller@crain.com
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Shortly before Christmas, an aide at the reception desk outside the offices of Cuyahoga County Executive Ed FitzGerald and his top staff was on the phone with a caller who was looking for the answer to a property tax question. “Let me connect you with our auditor’s office…” she started to say. “I mean our fiscal office.” That slip of the tongue — the 4-year-old reform government eliminated the elected office of county auditor and replaced it, as well as the county treasurer and the county recorder, with an appointed chief fiscal officer — is a reminder that the foundation of the new county government hasn’t yet fully set. While it’s far from perfect, and not exactly what the group of reformers who created the new county charter envisioned, the revamped structure has restored confidence in a county government that had been badly discredited by a corruption scandal that saw two elected officials and nearly 60 others convicted of fraud, bribery and conspiracy. “Overall, the first four years have been very, very positive,” said Bruce Akers, retired mayor of Pepper Pike and a leader of the reform movement. “The whole tenor, the ambiance, of the county government has become much more positive. I think it’s come a long way,” said Akers, a Republican who has watched a Democratic executive and a county council that is 8-3 Democratic dominate the new, generally bipartisan, government. Similarly, Joseph Gauntner, who joined county government in 1986, saw a smooth and effective transition from the inside. Gauntner was one of only two department heads under the old commission government who stayed on into the FitzGerald administration. He served for a time as FitzGerald’s deputy chief of staff for human services, before retiring in early 2014. “In the new government, there is a stronger emphasis on data and reporting,” said Gauntner, who served as director of the Department of Jobs and Family Services in the last years of the old county commission.
Opening doors Even FitzGerald, while proud of initiatives in economic development and elsewhere that he can personally take credit for (see sidebar), acknowledges the importance of the new form of government. “I could not have done those things under the old system,” he said in an interview just before Christmas. “The door was opened, but we had to go through it.” That interview took place in his eighthfloor office in the new county administration building, a structure that was not even on anyone’s to-do list when FitzGerald was sworn in on Jan. 9, 2011. That 600 county employees were able to move in this fall reflects the speed and transformational orientation of the new government. Less noticeable than a new building are the substantive changes that restored the public’s faith in county government and made county government more efficient and more effective. Among them: ■ Eight separate systems for hiring employees, fixing their pay and giving raises and promotions were merged into a single system that introduced merit-based practices over political patronage. ■ The county workforce was cut from 8,058 in 2010 to an estimated 7,600 for 2015. ■ FitzGerald and council collaborated to create a strict ethics policy and to hire an inspector general to monitor the conduct of county employees and contractors to the county. ■ The county implemented a program of shared and pooled services to help municipal governments reduce costs. It now offers communities the ability to use county programs for health care benefits, website development and sewer maintenance as well as the sheriff department’s community policing See REFORM, page 18
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“One of the other things was the degree of professionalism in some areas like information technology, engineering and financial operations,” he said. “There was a strong, legitimate emphasis on getting skilled professionals in those kinds of roles.”
ACE REPORT November’s job numbers see upward swing ■ Page 11
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