Audit calls for records on council staff

Thursday, Sept. 12, 2002 | 11:14 a.m.

The Las Vegas City Council support employees should be required "to record daily hours worked" to show that they are doing their jobs, an audit released this week says.

But the report by City Auditor Radford Snelding does not indicate whether such a punch-the-time-clock mentality will save the city money, cost more taxpayer funds to compensate for overtime pay or result in a loss of productivity as employees take comp time accrued after 40 hours per week.

The recommendation affects 19 appointed employees or executive assistants of the seven council members. Their jobs, in part, are to serve as community liaisons, responding to concerns of constituents.

Each council member is allowed three such employees, but Councilmen Gary Reese and Larry Brown each have only two. Mayor Oscar Goodman is allowed four, but currently has one vacancy.

The council support staff employees, who are not covered under the civil service guidelines, now report only the total hours worked during a two-week pay period.

"City staff should at a minimum be required to record daily hours worked and to submit this information to the time card approver," the audit dated Tuesday says.

The City Council is under no obligation to follow the recommendation of the audit.