Working as “One King County” brings healthcare enrollment success
The broad, county-wide participation of all King County departments and agencies, the committed and supportive leadership, and Public Health – Seattle & King County as a strong coordinating organization helped make the first season of healthcare enrollment a success in King County.
More than 165,000 King County residents signed up for low-cost or free health insurance during the six-month period ending March 31.
A report by Elizabeth Ambriz, a Public Health intern and Masters of Public Health Candidate at the University of Washington School of Public Health, found that the coordinated efforts of all County departments and agencies was central to the success of healthcare enrollment in King County.
Each County agency and department participated in the enrollment effort, drawing on their unique expertise and points of contact with the public to help reach eligible residents with information on healthcare coverage. Departments focused their work on four main strategies to provide healthcare reform information to the community: material distribution, presentations/briefings/trainings, digital/IT, and media/communications.
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Walk in the Shoes of a County Employee – Christopher Skilton, Public Health, Food and Facilities Protection
For the most recent participant in the Walk in the Shoes of a County Employee, I chose Health and Environmental Investigator Cristopher Skilton from the Public Health department’s Food and Facilities Protection section.
As someone who enjoys dining across our region, I was interested to spend a few hours with a restaurant health inspector learning how King County works with restaurants to keep the public healthy and safe. As I experienced Chris’ day-to-day routine, I learned that the investigator’s role is much more complex and collaborative than it’s traditionally been.
We began our day at University Village shopping area in Seattle, which has nearly 30 food businesses (out of nearly 10,000 countywide) offering a wide variety of site visit opportunities. First up: looking over an outline of activities in a typical visit then reviewing summaries from previous visits to seven candidate businesses.
Five were scheduled for unannounced, scored inspections, which happen twice each year for most eateries. The remaining two sites had the option of unscored educational consultations, which can be requested at any time and which give business owners a chance for no-penalty guidance on issues that could become inspection problems if not addressed.
One of my favorite vegetarian restaurants was on the list, and since it was near lunch time I grabbed a bite before our inspection. Then Chris introduced himself to the staff and I watched as he demonstrated the techniques, tools, and strategies for a site inspection, which is aimed at checking that food is being stored, prepared and served properly.
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Summer heat is here – help FMD keep you cool!
We’re expecting our first taste of real summer-like temperatures this week. The Facilities Management Division (FMD) is committed to your safety and comfort at work, and to running King County buildings as efficiently as possible. To help us all keep cooler as the weather warms, here are a few tips:
- Lower the blinds in your work area to reduce sunlight streaming in
- Keep windows and doors closed when the air conditioning is on
- Dress for the weather conditions
- Turn off unnecessary lights, and unplug unused electrical equipment
For a reminder, feel free to print out and post the FMD Summer Heat Reminder Flyer in your workspace. FMD will also be posting these flyers in public areas around King County buildings.
Thanks, and keep cool!
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Kudos! Congratulation on award for leading healthier lives
On June 10 we celebrated winning the Harvard Innovations Award, awarded to King County for our Healthy Incentives Program. We had a great time remembering all of the things that make this program unique and, for some of our employees, life-saving. The “What’s Your Reason” video that our co-workers put together is just the tip of the kind of creativity that led Harvard to award us this prize. Harvard Professor Stephen Goldsmith, who presented us with the plaque, told us we won not necessarily because we saved money but because we did it in such collaboration and partnership with the unions that represent County staff, and because we focused on both the demand side – how we use health care as employees – and the supply side – really reaching out and trying to change the market. Hats off to the whole crew in Healthy Incentives and to all of us employees for supporting them. – Nancy Buonanno-Grennan, Director, Human Resources Division
King County is awarded the 2013 Innovations in American Government Award from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government: (Left to right) King County Executive Dow Constantine; Whitney Abrams, Business Representative, Professional and Technical Employees, Local 17; Karleen Sakumoto, Employee Health & Well-Being Manager; Professor Stephen Goldsmith, Harvard Kennedy School; Caroline Whalen, County Administrative Officer; Kerry Schaefer, Strategic Planner, Employee Health & Well-Being.
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Kudos! Christine Nguyen, Customer Service Specialist III, Records and Licensing Services Division, DES
Good day, I was overseas for a year and when I returned, decided to get some personalized plates. There was a Christine who helped me at your 4th Street [Avenue] Office in Seattle at approximately 3:30 p.m. last Friday [May 2]. She not only took my plate application, but also let me know I could get tabs early (they were good until August, so I didn’t think it was possible to get them done early). She also reminded me that a new emissions test would also be needed and gave me excellent directions to the nearest station (I normally don’t get tested in Seattle area). She assured me all would be fine and updated once the emissions station input my results. I hurried to the station on 6th/Spokane, tested no problem, and drove back to work (NOAA has me back and forth from Seattle to Oregon). Yesterday, my new tabs and registration arrived to my work box in Oregon. I repeat, yesterday! That means in one workday (Monday), tabs/registration was printed, issued, routed to the post office. Honestly, this is the fastest I’ve ever seen any state government operate. I knocked out three things with one trip (plates, new tabs, emissions) and all because Christine pointed me in the right direction to update everything. Thanks for doing good work – Kyle B.
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Featured Job: Geographical Information Systems Specialist – Journey
Application deadline: Monday 07/07/14 4:30 PM
Salary: $33.76 – $42.79 Hourly / $2,700.80 – $3,423.20 Biweekly
Department: Department of Assessments
Description: The GIS Specialist (Cadastral Mapping) is primarily responsible for the maintenance of the King County GIS cadastral geodatabase. The ideal candidate will have a strong background in maintaining cadastral data in an ArcGIS versioned database. Additionally, the candidate will be production oriented and well versed in the translation and understanding of legal descriptions, deeds and property surveys. This position reports to the Mapping Unit Supervisor and takes technical direction from the GIS Coordinator.
Learn more about this position or view all available jobs
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Employees join clean sweep of Union Bay
Employees from Water and Land Resources Division (WLRD) were among the more than 300 volunteers who removed trash and debris from Union Bay as part of the 12th Annual Puget Sound Keeper’s Lake Union Sweep on May 17.
Environmental Lab Scientists Bob Kruger and Stephanie Hess used the lab’s 25-foot aluminum research vessel Chinook to pick up trash collected by kayakers and keep a general eye on safety, with Bob skippering the boat and Stephanie serving as a deck-hand.
They joined volunteers in kayaks, row boats, canoes and motorized craft for the annual clean up event, and were able to use some of the Chinook’s unique features to pick up larger items that smaller vessels were unable to pick up.
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Five Questions with Tre’ Maxie, Chief Deputy Assessor, Department of Assessments
1. What does your role as Chief Deputy Assessor involve? There are 39 Cities and over 160 taxing Districts that rely on the information generated by the talented staff in our Department to fund their budgets. Working under the leadership of King County Assessor Lloyd Hara, I work with a team to oversee the Department of Assessments. We provide nearly $4 billion in fair assessments that fund important areas such as education, roads, fire, and hospitals for all King County cities and districts. We also maintain property maps and administer the many generous levies approved by voters, among other things.
2. What do you like most about your job? Each day is different. One day, I am working with one of the many taxing jurisdictions to provide information about property values, while another I could be out with other King County offices listening to the concerns of our Constituents. On other days I am working with staff to work through a complex obstacle or to “put out a fire,” and in some cases I am working to “start a fire.” I enjoy the variety of my job!
3. What is the biggest challenge in your job? From a practical level the volume of email both from internal and external stakeholders. I like to be responsive, but if I responded immediately to every email, I could possibly spend the majority of my day answering and generating email. I am a people person, so I like to have a meeting and discuss things in person. However, the work pace does not allow for that. So I am trying new methods like “no email time” for an hour here and an hour there. But it’s not easy, I always have a feeling that I am missing an important email, but I am learning to be OK without being constantly plugged into email.
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State-of-the-art pump station comes to Kirkland
The city of Kirkland has a new neighbor in town.
“As a downtown merchant I can say we are really excited to welcome the pump station as our newest downtown neighbor. It’s the kind of neighbor that everybody wants; it’s clean, quiet and attractive,” Penny Sweet, Kirkland’s Deputy Mayor said.
Waste water from local Kirkland buildings travels to the pump station, where the water is then pumped to a waste water treatment plant in Renton. The treatment plant takes the waste water, recovers nutrients that can be used, and then treats the rest of the water so it can safely go into the Puget Sound.
“This [water pump] is an integral part of our system,” Pam Elardo, the director of the Wastewater Treatment Division, said.
The Kirkland pump station, which was built in 1964, got new equipment and a redesign. According to Sebel Yildiz, the capital project manager, the project replaced all equipment inside, including electrical equipment, control panels and generators.
“Everything is state of the art so it’s super quiet and there are no odors and it works just like a charm,” Elardo said.
On top of functionality, the Wastewater Treatment Division wanted the exterior of the building to add to the neighborhood.
“We want to build a facility that’s actually an asset to the neighborhood, not a sore thumb or something that’s ugly. So we spent a lot of time working with the community, getting their input on design,” Elardo said.
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More copies of Equity & Social Justice poster available
King County’s Equity & Social Justice poster is once again available for employees to display in their workspace.
If you need copies of the poster, which uses an “equity tree” to highlight the determinants of equity, for your conference room or office, please contact paula.harris-white@kingcounty.gov or matias.valenzuela@kingcounty.gov to make arrangements to pick some up or put some in inter-office mail to your work site.
Employee News 