Inweekly has investigated the circumstances surrounding the revisions to the City of Pensacola’s HR manual that eliminated the independent personnel board and modified the appeal process. Our research, and subsequent public record requests have verified, that the manual was not uploaded until four hours after Fire Chief Matt Schmitt and Deputy Fire Chief Joe Glover were placed on paid administrative leave.
While city officials have refused to be interviewed by Inweekly, they have not disputed when the new manual was created and uploaded. The metadata of the source document confirmed the date and time. The newspaper also discovered, via another public records request, that city directors and employees were given no written notification of the change.
On Friday afternoon, the paper learned that city officials have few written records to document the latest changes to the HR manual, and the available records show the changes made to appeal process were not handled as openly and transparently as other HR manual changes made since Dec. 1, 2015.
Here is what Inweekly learned from the public records released:
On Dec. 7, 2015, Deanna Lucia in the Finance Department sent an email to all city directors that the City’s Travel Training, which had been revised on Oct. 1, 2015 for the latest GSA per diem, had to be changed effectively immediately because: “Upon review of the Federal Travel Regulations that govern the GSA per diem rates, it has been determined that per diem is not allowable for travel tha this 12 hours or less.â€
City CFO Dick Barker sent an email to Ed Sisson (Chief Human Resources Officer) within an hour: “Please add to HR manual.â€
Upon a request from Sisson, Mandy Bills, also in Finance, sent HR the revised policy. Tracy Walsh, HR manager, made the changes to the HR manual and uploaded it to the city’s website by 3:20 p.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 8.
Please note the first step was to notify all the directors. Then upload the revised manual. The manual that Inweekly downloaded Dec. 9, 2015 reflected the Travel Training section was modified 12/7/15.
It should also be noted that when the original change for GSA per diem revision was made, Walsh sent out a notification to all directors:
From: Tracy Walsh

Sent: Wednesday, October 14, 2015 9:36 AM

To: Directors Plus 
Subject: New Training & Travel Form
As you may be aware, there are new changes to the Training & Travel form and policy, effective 10/1/15. I have attached the updated form for you to start using immediately. The policy has been updated in the Human Resources Manual also. You may access the Manual on the Human Resources’ page on the City’s website. The updated form will be available on the City’s new Intranet site as soon as it goes “liveâ€.
According to City Administrator Eric Olson, the decision to do away with the independent personnel board and change the appeal process was made in December.
The only other change to manual in December was made on Dec. 28, 2015. It was to one sentence in the introduction (change in bold): “Updates will be made to the electronic document located on the Human Resource Office’s Internal and External websites.â€
The new HR manual reflects that change was made 12/30/15.
The public records revealed that Tracy Walsh sent to Sisson a “Weekly Manager Debrief – 12/30/2015.â€
Walsh wrote,”The HR Manual has been partially updated. I will finish with the update as soon as I receive your updated version with corrections of the new appeal policy.â€
Why was this partial update so important? Why did it have to be made before the appeal process revision? It would appear Sisson was trying to avoid sending out notifications of any future changes to directors and employees. He and his staff would simply upload a new HR manual.
City emails reflect the changes to the Appeals Process were received on Jan. 8, 2016. Ed Sisson sent an email to Walsh at 3:03 p.m. on that Friday: “I have attached my most current version. Please review for typos, grammar, etc. The last section still has the background gray shaded boxes around the text…not sure how to get rid of it. Please get those up to speed and then post to the manual. Let me know when it gets posted please.â€
On Monday, Jan.11, Walsh replied to Sisson, “The changes have been added and posted.â€
However, the new HR manual was not uploaded to the city’s website. No emails were released to Inweekly that verify all directors were ever notified of the change. The paper was not given any emails or other documents that show approvals from Olson, City Attorney Lysia Bowling and Mayor Hayward of the revision.
The HR manual with the Appeal Process changed was not uploaded until after 2 pm on Feb. 2. That version reflects the change was made 1/8/16.