In light of recent findings from an audit that some Austin city employees padded their time sheets - in one case enough to double the salary - city manager Marc Ott sent a memo to Mayor Lee Leffingwell and members of the city council on the topic of ethics and integrity in the city work force.
As you know, I have personally made organizational and personal ethics and integrity a cornerstone of our approach to becoming a “best managed” city. In light of recent Audit findings relative to payroll records, I felt that it was important to provide you with an update on our progress.
As I’ve shared with you in our individual meetings, part of building an ethical culture is creating an environment where employees feel safe bringing their concerns forward, and giving them the confidence that any issue will be investigated and addressed once brought to light. We have several avenues for employees to do so, whether through their normal chain of command, our Human Resources Department, the Integrity Office or the City Auditor. This is a message that I’ve reinforced throughout the past two years, and it has been a core message of my seven “Straight Talk” sessions with city employees this year.
In the past year, we launched a citywide Integrity and Ethics training program designed to reach every City employee in two years. In conjunction with this, we conducted a full-day Ethics retreat with all City executives to reinforce the importance of the initiative. I’m proud to say that training has been completed by 98% of the employees targeted for the first phase of the program that began this spring.
In reference to specific issues raised in the past week regarding payroll processes, I assure you that we take any instances of fraud or abuse seriously, and are committed to addressing them swiftly and fairly. In terms of process controls, the Human Resources Department launched an initiative earlier this year to evaluate our current systems and develop a strategy for improving and upgrading our technologies.
With that said, I think it’s important to recognize that people are at the core of ethical decision-making. While technological upgrades may help us identify issues, any system is vulnerable to manipulation if someone is determined to do so. That’s why our sustained focus is on making sure that the people in our organization understand our expectations when it comes to ethics, that they feel safe to report possible violations, and that they understand the consequences of violating our contract of trust with the residents and taxpayers of Austin.
In an organization of nearly 12,000 employees, there will be unfortunate times where we have to address ethical lapses. The measure of our success will be that we handle them in an appropriate and transparent manner. I look forward to continued cooperation with the City Auditor in fostering a culture of trust and ethical decision-making for our organization.
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