2006 Outstanding Medium County

Speech presented by Jim Butler at June 6, 2006 CFSC Awards banquet

This year the awards committee spent many hours of debate on how to revamp the Outstanding County award. When all was said and done, I think we had the best quality competition in this category in years. Have we got it perfect? No. In fact, next year, we intend to mix in some improvement measures over this year's baseline and reduce the subjective portion of the voting even more. I'm interested in hearing your comments of how we can do better next year. Bend the ear of anyone on this year's or next year's board in the coming months and let us know your ideas.

The committee decided to select the best four counties in each size category based on 14 objective measures from the year-end reports. All the performance measures were broken down to a 'per FTE' figure for comparison. You can go on the website to see the details for the criteria. In fact, in the next week or two, I will post the most productive large, medium, and small county in each of those measures.

We then sent a letter to the administrator in each of the 12 nominee counties. We asked for a one-page response to just one question, "What did your county do that you think made it perform so well." Each of the award committee members, excluding me, then rated the administrators' responses. I then totaled up the score as follows:

20% for how well the county met the Task Force goals,
25% for the 12 non-financial per FTE measures
25% for how well the county collected current support
30% for the administrators' response.

In the medium county competition, the top two nominees battled and split the lead among 9 different categories.

The administrator attributes their success to the dedication of the technicians. They show respect to each other by having a worker of the month award. They show respect to their clients by sending thank you notes. Early intervention and help with job searches led to their success. The recipient of the 2006 Outstanding Medium County award is...
FREMONT COUNTY