Five Questions with Emmanuel Rivera, Health & Environmental Investigator III, Natural Resources & Parks
1. What was your first role at King County? My first role at King County involved working within the Local Hazardous Waste Management Program (LHWMP) as a Health and Environmental Investigator. As part of the Survey Team, I did business cold calls throughout King County regarding proper use, storage and disposal of hazardous products and waste. 2. What do you do as a Health and Environmental Investigator? As an HE&I III, I am currently the outreach coordinator for LHWMP’s Indoor Chemical Hazards project. My primary function is to provide outreach to underserved… Read More
Get to know four participants in 2015 Annual Giving Drive
Whether your passion is protecting animals, improving literacy, preventing hunger, helping seniors or young people, or supporting the arts, there are more than 930 participating nonprofit organizations that you can choose to contribute to in the 2015 Annual Giving Drive, which kicked off October 5. Click here to make a pledge. Meet four of this year’s participating nonprofits below (see full list of participating nonprofits here): Cowgirl Spirit Equine Rescue (9406) shelters, rehabilitates, and rehomes unwanted and slaughter-bound horses. Located in Carnation, Washington, its horses are cared for by an all-volunteer staff and supported… Read More
How Metro Transit helped employees make leap from driver to chief
Helping employees grow in their King County careers is a key objective of the Best-Run Government: Employees initiative and Metro Transit recently piloted an intensive program to help employees make the leap from bus operator to base chief. Transit’s Human Resources group built a process that recognized the skills of existing employees and helped them highlight their skills in the recruitment process. “We were understanding that we had a very well-qualified, diverse, talented pool of employees,” said Susan Eddy, Human Resources Service Deliver Manager with Metro Transit. “However when you took a… Read More
Healthy Local Eating coming to Healthy Incentives
King County’s Healthy Incentives program will begin a new pilot project in 2016 designed to help employees reduce their healthcare costs and support local farmers. The Healthy Local Eating pilot project, which will be implemented in two stages over 2016 and 2017, will offer employees the opportunity to reduce their out-of-pocket healthcare costs by purchasing locally grown fruits and vegetables through the Healthy Incentives employee wellness program. “We’re building on the success of our wellness program by providing employees and their families an extra incentive to support local farmers,” said Executive Constantine…. Read More
Environmental Lab protects local waters and public health
With more and more people enjoying water activities across our region each year, the work of the King County Environmental Laboratory is more important than ever in protecting the health of local waterways, wildlife and people. With five different lab areas, Lab employees are constantly collecting samples, analyzing environmental samples and generating data to protect the environment and those that live in it, Kate Leone, the Environmental Programs Section Manager, said. Unlike other laboratories, the Lab is a full service lab, meaning it runs through all the steps, from project planning, sample collection and testing, through to data generation. It processes… Read More
Untapped Potential: Behavioral Health Employment Program helps individuals with disabilities join the workforce
At a recent employment resource fair, staff from the King County Behavioral Health Supported Employment Program ran into Tiffany Turner, a graduate of the program. Tiffany now works full time as a manager at the Recovery Café, a community of support for individuals who have experienced trauma, mental health and/or substance use issues. As a single parent of three children, Turner had many challenges trying to raise her children with limited resources or support from others. She found herself overwhelmed and unaware of the symptoms of her illness or how to use… Read More
One King County for ending sexual exploitation and trafficking
Dear fellow King County employee, We’re fortunate to have a talented workforce dedicated to making King County a more just, more equitable community – a place where people’s rights are protected and everyone has the opportunity to achieve his or her full potential in life. As we showed when we helped nearly 200,000 residents sign up for affordable health insurance, we’re most effective at improving people’s lives when we work together as One King County to achieve a common goal. Now, I want to apply that same collective approach to confront a… Read More
Watching out for salmon in King County Waters
It’s that time of year again. The time when King County’s many creeks and rivers begin to receive colourful salmon for their spawning season. Each fall, several salmon species make their way from the ocean into the Puget Sound and into King County’s urban and rural streams to lay their eggs. It is an amazing natural process, Jennifer Vanderhoof said. As a senior ecologist for DNRP’s Watershed and Ecological Assessment, Vanderhoof coordinates a volunteer program to monitor salmon in the Lake Washington Watershed, called the Salmon Watcher Program. A multijurisdictional effort, the… Read More
Breaking down language barriers to make King County accessible to all
Imagine not understanding public service announcements or not being able to call an information line because they are not offered in your language. It is a problem that many King County residents face and something the Office of Equity and Social Justice (ESJ) and Customer Service Officers are trying to change. An Executive Order already requires printed public communications pieces and vital documents for broad distribution to be translated into at least Spanish, but the Office of ESJ and county agencies have been developing and implementing new ways to interact with the community and provide information. One approach is working with ethnic media, such as the… Read More
New IT tool helping local law enforcement
After two years of hard work, King County Information Technology (KCIT) and the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office (PAO) launched a new system known as eLODI, or Electronic Log of Detective Input. eLODI allows law enforcement officers throughout the county to electronically submit their referrals, evidence and case documents to the PAO’s case management system, PROSECUTORbyKarpel. One of the first to involve a Software as a Service (SaaS) vendor of this scale, eLODI was a collaboration of the PAO, Karpel Solutions, the KCIT Project Management Office (PMO), Business Analysis Group, Business Solution Services (BSS)… Read More
Employee News 