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Washington County hires new CYS administrator

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When a majority of the county commissioners promoted Kimberly Rogers to human services director, she also remained in her previous role at the helm of the Children and Youth Services agency until a replacement was on board.

The new administrator will be Anne Schlegel, the assistant deputy director at the Office of Allegheny County Children, Youth and Families.

Schlegel has worked for the Allegheny County agency since 1997, the year that she earned a bachelor’s degree in social work from California University of Pennsylvania.

She also had a one-year internship as a forensic interviewer for the Child Advocacy Center of Children’s Hospital, and holds a master’s degree from the University of Pittsburgh.

When the matter arose at a meeting of members of the Washington County Salary Board last week, commission Vice Chairman Larry Maggi requested that it be separated from an unrelated matter on the agenda.

Commission Chairman Diana Irey Vaughan, Commissioner Nick Sherman and County Controller Michael Namie voted to reduce the CYS administrator’s salary to $91,800.

The pay had been listed at $96,907 in the booklet-sized list of employees’ salaries adopted at the early January annual reorganizational meeting when Rogers, who was hired in 2013, was among those who were retained.

In early April, Rogers was promoted to human services director, overseeing CYS, Aging Services and Behavioral Health and Developmental Services, formerly known as Mental Health/Mental Retardation.

“I have nothing against them. I’m not sure who’s going to be filling this position,” Maggi said when casting his vote on the salary for the new CYS administrator. “I know there’s two applicants. The only thing I’m going to be voting ‘no’ on is the salary. I know it’s a reduction, but at this point I’m a little concerned about salaries.”

Salary board approves job slots and compensation, not the people who will fill them.

If another salary board member had joined Maggi in voting against the change in pay, a 2-2 vote would have resulted in a deadlock and the pay would have remained at the higher figure.

After the salary was approved, Irey Vaughan said the candidate would be informed of the board’s action and start her job as soon as possible. She noted that the other salary board action, abolishing a bookkeeper’s post in the register of wills office and replacing it with a clerk-typist, also resulted in a reduction in salary.

Maggi also voted against filling the human services directorship that had been vacant since the county sold the Washington County Health Center in Chartiers Township in 2017 and then-human services Tim Kimmel left the county’s employment for Premier, which purchased the facility.

Filling the human services post was an issue in the 2019 commissioners’ race. Irey Vaughan and Sherman favored it while Maggi and former Commissioner Harlan Shober advocated against it.

In the wake of the county’s disaster emergency declaration in March with the arrival of the novel coronavirus pandemic, the county sought and received several dozen voluntary furloughs among employees.

Irey Vaughan said she anticipated job losses in the county at large and the economic downturn in general would increase the need for what are known as human services.

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