ROBERT PIERCE
• Leader & Times
In 2023, Seward County Treasurer Mary Rose was looking for a way to cut overtime in her office.
“When I came on in 2022, there was 186 hours of overtime,” she said.
At that time, doors were closing at 5 p.m., and workers were not leaving the office until 5:30 p.m. or 5:45 p.m. Problems were likewise created with the Kansas Department of Revenue closing its help center at 4:30 p.m., leaving many local customers waiting until the next day for solutions to problems.
“We were getting to the point where some people were in here that whole 30 minutes, and we weren’t able to help them because we had to call the help desk,” Rose said.
So after some research and input from county commissioners, Rose and her team decided to implemented new closing time of 4:45 p.m., a move the commission voted unanimously to approve.
However, at the time, the county was installing a new software program to help with its financial transactions, and while Rose’s team anticipated to have a 75 percent cut in overtime for 2023, the treasurer’s office actually saw a jump to 244 hours of overtime that year between nine employees.
She did say, though, most of the extra overtime was done because the supervisor and deputy treasurer had to stay after hours to make sure the department was able to move forward, as well as keeping other departments running.
“A lot of that overtime was done between the supervisor and the deputy,” Rose said.
In 2024, however, Rose said the software has been in place for a year, and so far, the department has cut overtime by more than 54 percent.
“We’re doing really well,” she said in an August interview. “We’re going into the ninth month, and I’m hoping to be at 75 percent by the end of the year in savings of overtime. It took us a year to get there, but there were a lot of things we didn’t anticipate, nor did anybody foresee. We got on track, and we’re moving forward. Everything’s working well.”
Rose too said the 4:45 p.m. closing time is working well, and she has not seen any complaints to her knowledge.
“The girls have been able to get out of here by 5, 5:15,” she said. “We’re not staying until 5:30, 5:45, 6 o’clock. That’s been an improvement.”
Before the new closing time was chosen, Rose said several options were looked at to help cut overtime in the office.
“We looked at maybe opening at 7:30 in the morning and staggering the employees at different times,” she said. “We looked at getting off at noon on Fridays. We did scenarios we ran through. We discussed what past treasurers have done with the longevity in the office. We have people who have been here with the past treasurers.”
A few questions were asked along the way such as how well something would work and if it would work at the time, and Rose said she had one particular concern with one of the options.
“One thing I did not like was opening up early and not having a buddy system in the office,” she said. “Security and well being of the employee was my top priority.”
So with caution, office team members chose to go with the 4:45 p.m. closing time, all the while finding more plans that might work if that would not.
“Let’s see how that goes, and if we need to go into Plan B or Plan C, we’ll do that if we need to maneuver that and figure it out,” Rose said. “We seemed to all have come to an agreement 4:45 was good for us, and it’s worked well for us.”
Rose said she has not heard much feedback from the community with the new time, and she believes this is primarily due to how the idea was presented.
“I also wanted to convey that if you were coming in and you thought you weren’t going to make it by 4:45, the phones are still ringing, and we’re still answering,” she said. “We are 100 percent here for everybody in Seward County. If you’re coming in to tag a diesel, let us know when you’re here. We’ll open the door. We’ll let you in.”
In this way, Rose said her team has been flexible to the needs of county residents.
“We’ve had people where they’ve had to run and go do an errand or pick something up because they didn’t have insurance or something,” she said. “We let them back in, and we finish their thing because it was a Friday or whatever. We’re very mindful of that, and there wasn’t a whole lot of feedback from the community.”
Rose said the treasurer’s office team’s mail goal is to be there for everyone in the community and help them with all of their needs. She said while commissioners had many ideas of how to solve the overtime problem, which she was open to, at the end of the day, her staff was going to do what was right for the customers in the office.
Commission meetings typically take place at 5:30 p.m. the first and third Mondays of the month in the commission chambers directly above the treasurer’s office, and Rose said just prior to that time, those coming to the meetings can visibly see employees still at work.
“They’ve seen us still in here,” she said. “They have seen that. They’ve seen the people. Everybody’s come in here and seen the benches full and when we’ve been out the door. They were aware of it.”
Like her staff, Rose said the commission’s main concern was making sure employees were on hand to help citizens and make sure they have what they need.
“We’ve been very mindful of that and proactive on anything and everything that’s ever come through the doors or questions asked,” she said.
Rose too said having the capability for residents to complete transactions has helped curb overtime as well, and she feels she did not receive much flack from commissioners.
“Everybody’s going to ask questions,” she said. “How is it going to roll? How are we going to handle it? Will you put it out in the public?”
Rose said through the use of social media and newspaper, the new closing time has been posted in plenty of places for people to find.
“We haven’t had too many concerns about being here,” she said. “If they have to stay late because they have a customer, we’re still there.”
Rose became treasurer in late 2022, shortly before three new commissioners were sworn in and about the time the county began implementing its new software, and this is around the time she and others in her office began looking for ways to cut expenses, stay within the department’s budget and be frugal with taxpayers’ money, all the while mindful and what could and could not be done.
“One of the things that caught my eye was the amount of overtime that was done,” she said. “This year, we’ve been very mindful, and we’re on track with that.”
Rose said along with overtime and the need to save money, another big factor was having KDOR’s help line closing at 4:30 p.m., as well as the time it takes to close and balance drawers in the office.
“They are crossed-trained to do taxes and to do vehicles,” she said. “They have two programs they have to close down every day and balance. If anybody’s ever had to balance a drawer down with the accounting part, they would have to do that twice every day, and we’re talking 10, 15 minutes per drawer depending on how the amount of transactions done and if they have any problems with it. That came into factor – the amount of time you need to close down your drawer and balance your transactions for that day. We balance that night when we close the doors.”
While the 75 percent reduction is not quite there for 2024, Rose said she will be quite excited to see it if it comes. She likewise feels the decision to move the closing time to 4:45 p.m. was a great one.
“Our goal was 75 percent, so we’re almost there, and I’ll be super excited if we see that 75 percent of savings,” she said.
“We’ve been doing well,” she continued. “We’ve been saving on things. So far, it’s been a good decision. We’re still able to serve all the people in Seward County. We’re able to get their tags to them, and if they have an issue and one of the girls needs to be here later or I need to be here, we’re here for them. It’s not set in stone.”
