Published by the County Administrative Office

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Kern County GIS 2

Admin Bulletins 3

Deferred Comp Workshops

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Employee Info @ Personnel

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inside:inside:

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BY PROCLAMATION

of the Board of Supervi-

sors, July 7 through 13 is

Healthy Air Living Week

in Kern County. The pur-pose of this event is to pro-mote lifestyle changes that anyone can make to improve the air

quality in our communities.

This valley-wide air quality aware-ness campaign is the product of the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District—of which our very own Supervisor Ray Watson is a Board member. Healthy Air Living replaces the “Spare the Air” cam-paign which focused on reducing pol-

lution in response to episodes of se-verely degraded air quality. Healthy Air Living focuses on real changes that individuals—like yourself—can

make all year long.

The County of Kern has pledged to do its part to promote clean air, and wants employees like you to take the lead making healthy air lifestyle changes, now and in the future. With

over 10,000 County employees, our choices can add up to a big difference in the health of our local environment

and the health of our fellow residents.

Be sure to check out the links at http://countynet/apps/healthy-air.asp including KernCOG’s Commuter Connection for organizing carpools, bike routes, and many other healthy-

air-living resources and tips.

LIVINGLIVINGLIVINGLIVING HEALTHY AIR HEALTHY AIR HEALTHY AIR HEALTHY AIR

employee COUNTY OF KERN

news

HEALTHY AIR LIVING TOYOTA PRIUS GIVEAWAYHEALTHY AIR LIVING TOYOTA PRIUS GIVEAWAY

To help encourage individual actions toward reducing air pollution, the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Con-trol District is giving away a Toyota PRIUS! To enter the contest you must first pledge to start at least seven

healthy air activities, such as:

● Carpool, van pool, or take public transportation

● Walk or bike instead of driving

● Walk to lunch or brown-bag it

● Use electric lawn care equipment instead of gas-

powered

● Use propane or natural gas to barbeque—not charcoal

● Use compact fluorescent bulbs

● Install energy efficient appliances

For more information onthis event and to enter to win the Toyota PRIUS, go to www.healthyairliving.com.

The deadline to enter is close of business July 31, 2008.

July 2008

County of Kern Employee News

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The Kern County GIS system in-cludes the software to generate cus-tom maps, a massive database with 13 terabytes (13,000 gigabytes) of storage, and the specialized techni-cians who manage the data in order to make it available for employees to access and use. Synchronizing all GIS efforts County-wide is the GIS

Coordinator, Jeff Orton.

Housed in the Engineering and Sur-vey Services Department of the Re-source Management Agency (RMA), Jeff has worked as the County’s GIS Coordinator for the past six years, ever since the position was first cre-ated. In that time, Jeff and the other GIS technicians have been able to make GIS available for all County

departments, some of which even have their own GIS Specialist to manage data specific to that department. Departments like Planning, Public Health, the Fire De-partment, Sheriff, and the Ag Commissioner can use GIS ex-

tensively in their work.

As Jeff explains it, GIS is “not just a picture, there is data behind it.” With a trained and knowledgeable operator, GIS software can show massive amounts of data, descrip-tively displayed by location or area. GIS maps can take information from a database that might normally be seen as a list or table—for example, all dairy farms or schools within a

certain zip code—and can display them as they occur in the land-scape, showing relationships and information that might otherwise be missed. “It’s a data manage-

ment tool.”

How GIS works is, first, the maps are “drawn” out to measure-ment by technicians. Jeff explains that this process most often in-volves tediously typing in coordi-

County of Kern County of Kern County of Kern County of Kern has a powerful tool to access and analyze a wide variety of information.

Called the Geographic Information SystemGeographic Information SystemGeographic Information SystemGeographic Information System, or GISGISGISGIS, this

method of data storage and retrieval can put tons of

County-related information ranging from agricultural

crop types to public safety incidents like fires and crime

in the form of customizable, visually-enhanced maps.

Jeff Orton Jeff Orton -- GIS Coordinator GIS Coordinator

(Continued on page 4)

County of Kern Employee News

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DDDDDDDDDDDDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERREDEFERRED C C C C C C C C C C C COMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATIONOMPENSATION W W W W W W W W W W W WORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPSORKSHOPS If you happened to miss the two held in June, look for four workshops covering

the in-and-outs of Deferred Compensation coming in August and November.

WhatWhatWhatWhat ISISISISISISISIS Deferred Compensation?Deferred Compensation?Deferred Compensation?Deferred Compensation?

Kern County’s Deferred Compensation Plan—a governmental 457(b)—is a type of retirement

savings account that allows you to supplement your County retirement. You can voluntar-

ily deduct a portion of your pay to save and invest. The account is

tax-deferred, which means you pay no taxes on your contributions

or the earnings until you withdraw money. Your Deferred

Compensation account balance can also be rolled-over to an-

other type of retirement account including 401(k), 403(b), 401(a),

or even an IRA.

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Organized by the Treasurer’s Office, these educational

sessions will be held in the Third-floor Multi-Purpose

Room in the County Administrative Center at 1115

Truxtun Avenue. All sessions are at 10:00 AM. All

full-time employees are eligible and can attend up to

two one-hour workshops per calendar year during

work hours. The workshops will be as follows:

● Asset Allocation—Diversifying Your Investments

(August 19) A look at how investing in different

assets—stocks, bonds, and cash equivalents—can

affect your overall investment performance and risk.

● Exploring Investment Fundamentals (August 26)

Focused on the basics of major investment types,

you will learn how stocks, bonds, and cash equiva-

lents work, along with their advantages and disad-

vantages.

Exploring Investment Fundamentals will be re-

peated on November 14

● How to Use Plan Services (November 11)

An introductory guide to accessing your plan’s

online services through the KEYTALK® website.

Be sure to reserve your spot soon, as space is limited.

To get more information or to RSVP to attend simply

email deferredcomp@co.kern.ca.us or call (661) 868-

3447.

SEVERAL NEW

policies were re-cently added to

the Administrative Poli-cies and Procedures Manual as Administrative Bulletins 32,

33, and 34.

Bulletin #32: Employee Sugges-

tion Award Program. This is an update to an existing program where employees who make suggestions that improve efficiency, cost sav-

ings, or customer services can re-ceive cash awards up to $10,000, or from $100 to $1,000 for more

“intangible” improvements.

Bulletin #33: Employee Recogni-

tion Award Program (ERAP). ERAP uses a new awards ceremony to recognize employees who surpass expectations in their jobs through outstanding leadership, customer

service, or workforce excellence.

Bulletin #34: Employee Recogni-

tion Notices. This is another new effort to publicize top County em-ployees who are hired, promoted or receive significant honors. The County will recognize its leading employees in an article published by

the Bakersfield Californian.

To learn more, check out the Ad-ministrative Policy and Procedures Manual on the CAO website at www.co.kern.ca .us/cao/policy/

appendix.asp.

NNNEWEWEW!!! Administrative Policy Bulletins

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County of Kern Employee News

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Employee ResourcesEmployee ResourcesEmployee Resources @@@ Personnel Personnel Personnel Hard at work making work life easier, the Personnel Department provides

some incredibly helpful features on its Internet and CountyNet pages.

Personnel’s newly revamped “Job Openings / Related Information” page (http://www.co.kern.ca.us/jobs/) offers an enhanced look and greatly expanded access to infor-mation. For those looking for pro-motional or transfer opportunities or recommending County employ-ment to friends or family, this is an unparalleled resource for employ-ment information. Be sure to check out the “Job Openings FAQ” (Frequently Asked Ques-tions), which features questions and answers explaining the inner-workings of applying with the

County.

For employees needing informa-tion on anything from paydays and holidays to Civil Service Rules and

the Suggestion Award Program, the Personnel Department’s main page of the County website (http://www.co.kern.ca.us/person/) is still the place to go. You’ll notice that here too, under the “General Ref-erence” section, we have another FAQ—this time specifically for current employees—called the “Employee FAQ.” Topics covered include transfers, promotion, vaca-tion, and resignation among many,

many others.

Employees who give (or even re-ceive) Performance Appraisals may wish to read over the new “Rater’s Guide to Performance Appraisals” (http://countynet/services/employee-maint/raters-guide.pdf). This PDF booklet of-

fers guidance on how the appraisal system works and how to best ap-proach the process with a positive attitude for helping to increase mo-rale and productivity. Also geared more toward supervisors is the “Personnel Administration FAQ” on CountyNet (http://countynet/services/personnel-administration-faq.asp), which provides informa-tion on hiring and employment issues from the managerial side of things and a “Master List” of up-coming job fairs for recruiting de-par tments (http:/ /countynet/

services/job-fairs.asp).

For even more information on Per-sonnel-related issues you can con-tact your department analyst or

email personnel@co.kern.ca.us. KC

KC

nates. GIS maps consist of “layers” of data, which are described spatially, by location. Each layer contains coordi-nates describing the location or area of certain items. One layer may have fire stations shown, or parks, or Supervi-sorial districts, while others might show the grid of section and township divisions used to legally define boundaries and place (shown on page 2). “Three of us spent a year and a half putting together the section coor-dinate layer.” More than the database storage and licenses for GIS software, “getting data in [the system] is the most time-consuming and expensive part.” However, once the data is in the system, users can view the features and information they need by simply

enabling the needed layers on the map.

While some departments have spe-cialized GIS databases for their work, a lot of information is available to all County departments. Jeff conducts training sessions twice a year to show employees how to use the software for

their departments. There is also a stripped-down basic version of the GIS database available to the public by clicking the link “Online Maps -

GIS” on the main County webpage, or http://maps.co.kern.ca.us/imf/sites/krn_pub/launch.jsp

and a more advanced intranet version available for County employees at http://gisweb/imf/sites/krn/launch.jsp. The online map sees a lot of traffic, aver-aging 15,000 hits a day and peaking at around 30,000 hits during the County Treasurer’s tax sale. The interest gen-erated by the sale has even had Jeff receiving phone calls from as far away as Taiwan with questions about using

Kern County GIS to view properties.

One interesting feature of the online GIS mapping tool is a layer containing detailed aerial photographs taken in 2000, 2003, and 2006 (pictured on page 2) that show the entire County from a bird’s-eye view. Jeff has been hard at work pulling together funding from different agencies—41 to be ex-act—to raise the $410,000 needed to update these aerial photographs with

newer, higher resolution images. New aerial photographs should be available online in September or October of

2008.

With plans to improve the use of GIS in County government and the ever increasing amount of data made avail-

able by our GIS technicians, you can expect some exciting new develop-ments from the Kern County Geo-graphic Information System. For more information on receiving GIS training for you or for your depart-ment, you can contact Jeff Orton at

ortonj@co.kern.ca.us.

Kern County GIS (from page 2)