We at Clerk of Court Watch, received the following email from a former employee of that office. This really backs up much of what we have said in the past…and much more! This article stems from a comment left by this former employee in this article, and the request I made to this person here. This email really speaks for itself:
“I worked in the Erie County Clerk of Courts office for many years. I left the office before the 2008 election. During that time, I continually witnessed the office spiral out of control due to Barb Johnson’s lack of caring, lack of motivation, and lack of experience. I would like to make the following points about the COC office and how it is run under Barb Johnson:
1) According to State Law, a public official only needs to be in their office 1 day out of 90. Barb Johnson is paid $55,000 a year, and she was hardly ever in her office. There were many, many times where she would call the office shortly after we opened for the day and say that she would be in around 10:00, or 11:00 and wouldn’t come in until 3:30 or even 3:50 just so she could say she was in that day (Editors Note: the office closes at 4:00). She was hardly ever in the office. I realize that during a portion of that time that she was the sole care-giver of her ailing dad, and husband. I heard her say numerous times something to the effect, “I’m so glad I have this job that allows me to stay at home and care for him,” which I wanted to respond, “Yeah, would you allow any of us girls to do the same? I don’t think so!” As you have mentioned on your web site in the past, she has robbed the tax payers, because who among us could work so little and still get paid their full salary? Why is it OK for her to do that and still receive a full salary, but not OK for any of the other office workers? My feeling was, if she needed to stay at home and take care of her ailing father and husband, she should have retired to do so – she definitely had the years in to retire. According to your website, she is in almost everyday, but not getting any work done (why doesn’t that surprise me).
2) It also seems from your web site that her attendance record is much improved, yet she still is not doing anything to “manage or lead” (as you have stated in the past) the office. This sounds like Johnson, because she was out of the office so much, when she was there, she had no idea what to do about anything. Due to her poor attendance record, she did not run the office very effectively and with virtually no supervision, leaving her staff to fend on their own. She did not even have a Chief Deputy Clerk position authorized in her staffing to manage and supervise her office. She did have a supervisor and an assistant supervisor in the office, but they were there in name only because they had absolutely no power to do anything. There were a few times where I saw that she had reprimanded a supervisor over something that the supervisor had handled correctly, but it seems that Barb wanted to exert her “power” and belittle the supervisor. As a result, the supervisor eventually stopped supervising because she never knew when she would be reprimanded for doing something correctly.
3) Because of her poor attendance record, she never got things done, nor did she follow through with things that were strongly encouraged by commissioners or her staff such as: 1) automated phone system; 2) employees sick and vacation time; 3) hiring more help or replacing help that has left; 4) reconciling the checking account with outstanding cases; 5) collect court costs that are owed (estimated to be at $750,000 or more); 6) ordering basic supplies for the office; 7) getting the dockets on-line (she’s been talking about doing this since 2000); 8) getting old records/cases either scanned into the office computers, or microfilmed). 9) Better security measures for the office. I believe that some of these have already been covered on your website.
4) She had a problem keeping accurate records of her employees sick and vacation time. When I left the office a couple of years ago, none of her employees knew how much sick and vacation time they had. As a result, some of her employees had taken more sick and vacation time than they were allowed possibly costing the tax payers thousands of dollars.
5) She usually showed up to county meetings late (if at all), and when she did show up, she sat in the back of the room and usually did not participate in the meetings.”
This article will be continued next week.
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Saturday, September 19, 2009
AREAS OF CONCERN 9: MONITORING PROGRAM TO KEEP CASES FROM BEING ILLEGALLY REMOVED FROM THE OFFICE
One of the 11 Areas of Concern that were brought up in the Fall 2008 campaign for the Erie County Clerk of Courts was the fact that there is no monitoring system in place to keep cases from being illegally removed from the office. This simply is a case of putting in place a system similar to what public libraries, stores, or movie rental places have in place to keep books, movies, or unpaid store merchandise from leaving the premises without first proper checking out and / or paying for said goods.
There have been numerous times over the years where there have been files that have come up missing. Most of the time (but not all of the time) the files have been found either in the Judge’s office, or Mrs. Johnson’s home (Tsk, Tsk, Barbara, you know those files are suppose to stay in the Court House). I have heard over the years that there were a few files that (last I heard) were never found. Right now, it is very easy to walk into that office, find the file that one wants, slip it into their brief case and walk out with no one having any knowledge to what just happened. Not only is it bad policy to let files out of that office, it is against the law; with the exception of Judges who are allowed to have them in their office.
If a monitoring system was put in place, this would never be a problem again; even the Judges offices would have to “sign out” files. But then why would you expect our “NOTHING” clerk to do anything about this problem? After all, over the past 20 years, she has done “NOTHING” about everything.
She either has no clue as to what to do, or where to begin, or she is just completely overwhelmed by how bad that office has gotten over the past 20 years that she has been in charge, and she really doesn’t know where to start or how to begin cleaning up her own mess.
Too bad, and so sad; especially since OUR tax money is paying her to do “NOTHING” about everything.
To you the voter I ask: Does this look like she is doing the job that she was elected by YOU THE VOTERS AND TAX PAYERS of Erie County to do?
Next week’s article will be about another possible devastating blow to that office. Stay tuned folks; it just keeps getting worse and worse.
There have been numerous times over the years where there have been files that have come up missing. Most of the time (but not all of the time) the files have been found either in the Judge’s office, or Mrs. Johnson’s home (Tsk, Tsk, Barbara, you know those files are suppose to stay in the Court House). I have heard over the years that there were a few files that (last I heard) were never found. Right now, it is very easy to walk into that office, find the file that one wants, slip it into their brief case and walk out with no one having any knowledge to what just happened. Not only is it bad policy to let files out of that office, it is against the law; with the exception of Judges who are allowed to have them in their office.
If a monitoring system was put in place, this would never be a problem again; even the Judges offices would have to “sign out” files. But then why would you expect our “NOTHING” clerk to do anything about this problem? After all, over the past 20 years, she has done “NOTHING” about everything.
She either has no clue as to what to do, or where to begin, or she is just completely overwhelmed by how bad that office has gotten over the past 20 years that she has been in charge, and she really doesn’t know where to start or how to begin cleaning up her own mess.
Too bad, and so sad; especially since OUR tax money is paying her to do “NOTHING” about everything.
To you the voter I ask: Does this look like she is doing the job that she was elected by YOU THE VOTERS AND TAX PAYERS of Erie County to do?
Next week’s article will be about another possible devastating blow to that office. Stay tuned folks; it just keeps getting worse and worse.
Saturday, September 12, 2009
NEW ARTICLE NEXT WEEK
Due to circumstances beyond our control, the next article for this site will appear next Saturday, September 19.
Feel free to comment on any of the MANY already existing articles. After all, over the past 7 months, we have done more work on this web site, than our "NOTHING" clerk has done over the past 20 years in office.
Feel free to comment on any of the MANY already existing articles. After all, over the past 7 months, we have done more work on this web site, than our "NOTHING" clerk has done over the past 20 years in office.
Saturday, September 5, 2009
DOWN THREE PERSONNEL AND COUNTING
There have been numerous times over the past several months of this blog site’s existence that we have mentioned how over – worked and understaffed the COC office has been over the past several years. Let’s fast forward to 2008.
In the first half of 2008 there were 3 employees in the Clerk of Courts office who retired. Now when one retires, a good leader would hire someone 2-3 weeks BEFORE the person retires so that the retiree can train the rookie.
Not in the COC office.
Three employees retired in the first half of 2008, and Johnson hired 2 people to replace the retirees a few months AFTER the retirees retired. The third employee to have retired has never been replaced.
So that puts the office staff down by one.
Then, as was mentioned in this article, the supervisor of the Title Dept., Sandra Brown, abruptly quits sometime in May 2009. As of the end of August 2009, there has been no replacement for Mrs. Brown.
That puts the office staff down by two.
The past several weeks I have noticed that another employee has not been in the office. I was told that she too has resigned from her position with no one hired to replace her.
That puts the office staff down by three.
So here we are down three with no replacements. They are dropping like flies in that office! ! ! Now the question is whether she has not replaced these employees because the commissioners won’t allow her to do so due to budget cuts, or she has not replaced these employees because she has never gotten “around to it” or (as the age old joke states) “a round Tuit.” Knowing her “NOTHING” attitude, I’m willing to bet that it’s the latter.
IF Barb Johnson had been a good manager/leader and in the office everyday for the past 20 years and learned the ins-and-outs of the office, she would have known how to handle situations like this. This is just proof how she has absolutely NO EXPERIENCE what-so-ever in managing that office even though she has been placed in charge of that office by the voters for the past 20 years! !
Well, now the overworked and stressed office is already down by three with no relief in sight. There are 2-3 girls in that office that are surely eligible for retirement (one in particular who has been there for over 30 years). The question is: will Johnson hire some new faces or wait until well after these 2 or 3 girls retire to let the office staff drop to 5-6 before she begins to even think about what is best for the office. With Johnson seemingly being disinterested in hiring replacements, that sends a message to the County Commissioners that she really doesn’t need the help, so why should they give her the green light to hire replacements? After all, there is a budget to cut and she brings the “perception” that she can do with less help.
This drop in office staff personnel, along with records not being on line, is a cause for great concern for Erie County tax payers who pay her salary. She is NOT doing her job, and yet she still gets paid……for doing “NOTHING.” How many of us can do that at our jobs?
Too bad, and so sad; especially since OUR tax money is paying her to do “NOTHING” about everything.
To you the voter I ask: Does this look like she is doing the job that she was elected by YOU THE VOTERS AND TAX PAYERS of Erie County to do?
In the first half of 2008 there were 3 employees in the Clerk of Courts office who retired. Now when one retires, a good leader would hire someone 2-3 weeks BEFORE the person retires so that the retiree can train the rookie.
Not in the COC office.
Three employees retired in the first half of 2008, and Johnson hired 2 people to replace the retirees a few months AFTER the retirees retired. The third employee to have retired has never been replaced.
So that puts the office staff down by one.
Then, as was mentioned in this article, the supervisor of the Title Dept., Sandra Brown, abruptly quits sometime in May 2009. As of the end of August 2009, there has been no replacement for Mrs. Brown.
That puts the office staff down by two.
The past several weeks I have noticed that another employee has not been in the office. I was told that she too has resigned from her position with no one hired to replace her.
That puts the office staff down by three.
So here we are down three with no replacements. They are dropping like flies in that office! ! ! Now the question is whether she has not replaced these employees because the commissioners won’t allow her to do so due to budget cuts, or she has not replaced these employees because she has never gotten “around to it” or (as the age old joke states) “a round Tuit.” Knowing her “NOTHING” attitude, I’m willing to bet that it’s the latter.
IF Barb Johnson had been a good manager/leader and in the office everyday for the past 20 years and learned the ins-and-outs of the office, she would have known how to handle situations like this. This is just proof how she has absolutely NO EXPERIENCE what-so-ever in managing that office even though she has been placed in charge of that office by the voters for the past 20 years! !
Well, now the overworked and stressed office is already down by three with no relief in sight. There are 2-3 girls in that office that are surely eligible for retirement (one in particular who has been there for over 30 years). The question is: will Johnson hire some new faces or wait until well after these 2 or 3 girls retire to let the office staff drop to 5-6 before she begins to even think about what is best for the office. With Johnson seemingly being disinterested in hiring replacements, that sends a message to the County Commissioners that she really doesn’t need the help, so why should they give her the green light to hire replacements? After all, there is a budget to cut and she brings the “perception” that she can do with less help.
This drop in office staff personnel, along with records not being on line, is a cause for great concern for Erie County tax payers who pay her salary. She is NOT doing her job, and yet she still gets paid……for doing “NOTHING.” How many of us can do that at our jobs?
Too bad, and so sad; especially since OUR tax money is paying her to do “NOTHING” about everything.
To you the voter I ask: Does this look like she is doing the job that she was elected by YOU THE VOTERS AND TAX PAYERS of Erie County to do?
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