Our judges are not county employees.  They are state employees.  I believe Talk of the Town's statement is correct as it applies to Judge Oberholzer.

Stickbugs, the County does not allow "years and years" of vacation time to accrue.  The maximum accrual for an employee with 15 or more years of service, is 672 hrs.  (this equates to approximately 16 weeks) When (if) that number of hours is reached, vacation time stops accruing until some of it is used.  At retirement, the employee is given the choice of being paid out their accrued vacation time, or taking "terminal vacation" which means that the employee may give a "quit date" several months in advance (depending on how much time is accrued), but actually stop showing up for work in a week or two, and actually use the rest of his/her vacation time.

With sick leave, there is a percentage of accrued time that one can take payment for upon retirement, but I'm not sure if it's a lump sum, or if it actually changes the monthly benefit amount of the retiree over his/her lifetime.

Hi, I'm Adam Alvidrez. I took a Criminal Justice class that Judge "O" taught years ago. I learned a lot about the court process and it was very apparent at the time, that Judge "O" was very passionate about his job. I learned to appreciate the work that goes into the system.

No doubt he has worked very hard for his vacation, and I agree with some of you, if he knows for a fact that he's going to retire right after his 6 months vacation, then the County/State should start the replacement process now, it just makes sense. But, Judge "O" has said, he'll  "probably retire next year". .that doesn't mean in January 2008 or March 2008. "next year" means anytime next year, so as much as we want to proceed, we can't. That's the reality, and he should be able to enjoy his vacation without feeling guilty for taking one, and putting up with all of this crap.

My employer only allows us to accrue up to 2 years worth of vacation time.   My husband's employer doesn't accrue past years vacation at all, you lose everything after June 30th if you didn't use it during the year.  I didn't realize that the county allowed years and years of vacation to build. 

I agree with theColorNine...pay the man the vacation money and get on with it.  But I do think that a policy should be in place that requires more timely use of vacation time. 

Does anyone know if the county allows you to get paid for your accrued sick when you retire or do you have to "go on vacation"?

Just pay him all his accrued vacation time and let him go so that a new judge can be appointed.

What do some of you find objectionable about the consultant work?  It sounds like you hold it against the individual who might engage in it, rather than the entity which employs the consultant.

I say that anyone who has worked as many years as Judge Oberholzer has - and who had dealt with the garbage he has through the years is taking his due vacation!  When I was a county employee, and left  for Maternity leave, I used every ounce of Comp. time, vacation time, sick time and every ounce of any time I had left (with pay of course) before I had to decide whether or not to return to work.  Of course, I knew in my heart that I didn't want to return....and I was thankful not to have to!

I do feel as though he deserves full compensation for his time - but putting the court system (and our local judges who are already over worked and stressed) is ridiculous.  I agree with randomfactor - I would be ticked off if he did what many others have done - retired, gotten paid his full vacation and then signed on to do the same job at "consultant's" prices.   

My thoughts? Her union negotiated very favorable perks in her contract. Excusing teachers from jury duty to cut cost is not a good idea. People complain about the current jury pool already without diminishing it further.

Congrats on the judge getting 6 months paid vacation time. It's part of his benefits package and he earned it.

My first question is why in the world sick time ever came into this conversation?  That was not part of the original topic.

Second, I say just pay the man what he would have earned for that vacation time and get a new judge in there ASAP.  Is it really that hard?  Do you honestly believe that he would not take that offer if they gave it to him?

You want to talk about wasting tax payers money, we need to start working on other ways within our court system to cut costs.  For instance... teachers on jury duty.   A good friend of mine is an elementary school educator and was recently called for jury duty.  She went, was paid for her time there (salary & jury pay)... and the city also had to pay for her temporary replacement.  If every teacher in the city/county were excused from jury duty then we would no longer be double paying staff from the budget.

thoughts?

When I was called to jury duty I served on Oberholzer's trial.  Like most judges I had to serve jury duty under, Oberholzer seemed to genuinely care about not wasting taxpayers dollars.  Oberholzer was quite nice until the lawyers' lack of readiness caused the case to be extended longer than it should have.  I cannot blame him for wanting to use the vacation time that he has earned while working for the superior courts.

And, at my work, unused sick pay is paid out at the anniversary of your hiring if not used up throughout the year.

Here's the "sucky deal," to quote pamg, in my opinion:  I heard Oberholzer gave no advance notice of his intention to be gone for half a year.  I heard he finished up with court business last Friday afternoon, cleaned out his chambers (is that the sign of someone who plans to return??), and announced he was going on *vacation* for six months.  Regardless of whether or not he earned the extended time off, tax payers will now have to pay additional for retired judges to take the case load Oberholzer would have had.  Either that or put an extra load for an extended period of time on the already overworked judges and other court personnel.  May I see a show of hands, please, who among us has an employer and fellow colleagues who would take kindly to one of us flipping off the lights late on a Friday afternoon and saying, "Oh, btw . . .  I'm not coming back for six months.  Deal with it."  All I see here is someone who thinks only of himself; just like when he basically told the prosecutor in the Sons case "Screw your wedding plans.  I want you to try the case when it's convenient for me."

And something else doesn't sit right with me about this:  Will we be seeing other judges (who I believe are technically state employees) and county employees using this same tactic when they decide to retire?

He earned the vacation through years of public service.... he has every right to take it.

Folks would scream if he were simply paid for the vacation time, too. 

.

Now, where you're "milking" the system is when you retire, then sign back on as a "consultant."  *THAT* I would object to.