Three County Departments Lauded for Innovation, Service to Public

County departments are always looking for ways to stretch our tax dollars and provide the best service possible to the residents of Collin County.

In June and July, the Texas Association of Counties (TAC) and the National Association of Counties (NACo) affirmed that philosophy by recognizing the county's Health, Information Technology and Human Resources departments with five awards for their innovative work in providing indigent health care, online services connectivity, a new pay-for-performance plan for county law enforcement officers, and developing an employee health & wellness program to curb increasing health coverage costs.

Indigent Health Care: Through a contract with local PrimaCare treatment centers, the county's Health Care Services department drastically reduced the average cost-per-visit for its Indigent Health Care Program. Two years ago, the cost for more than 950 office visits topped $1.2 million - or, about $1,315 on average for each visit. This included Emergency Room visits and hospitalizations. Beginning in January 2007, however, the county's contract with PrimaCare helped make doctor visits easier for qualified patients and cut unnecessary emergency room visits hospitalizations for an average cost-per-visit of $115. At the same time, average costs for E.R. visits and hospitalizations dropped to $774. Besides making more funds available for indigent patients who have serious health care needs, we are now able to treat more patients at a fraction of the cost - and the savings to taxpayers has been enormous. TAC decided to recognize the county for this program with a 2008 Best Practices Award.

Fiber Optics & Connectivity: By late 2005, the county's online services and growing technological needs called for upgrading aging T1 lines with a faster fiber network. Problem was, to connect all county facilities, we needed about 124 miles of fiber optic wiring to pull it off at a cost of millions. Instead, our Information Technology folks joined forces with the Collin County Community College District to share some of its existing "dark" - unused -- proprietary fiber strands already in place, saving taxpayers more than $1.5 million in installation and maintenance costs. A homeland security grant also helped link up local cities and school districts with more strands. All of this included back-up, redundant - and secure - lines for emergency communications and government business transactions, plus the ability to bring innovative programs such as the state district courts' video plea system at virtually no added cost. Again, TAC awarded Collin County with a Best Practice Award for 2008.

Law Enforcement Pay-For-Performance: Our Human Resources department worked with the Sheriff's Office and Constables' offices to phase in a customized job evaluation and training documentation program so that law enforcement officers would be receive raises based on their individual job performance rather than a uniform, across-the-board pay increase method that rewarded average and exceptional performers equally. Not only does the Pay-for-Performance program give supervisors the ability to offer betters raises to their top-performing officers, it also tracks development and training goals to help development all employees' careers. NACo commended the county with a 2008 Achievement Award for this effort.

Employee Health & Wellness Program: Our Human Resources and Health Care Services departments had a two-fold interest in developing this program over the last three years. Healthcare claims had climbed far above what other local governments were seeing within their employees, and many of our workers were undergoing more extensive medical treatments due to a lack of knowledge and preventive measures to help detect and manage health problems early - such as diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol. By instituting a battery of programs such as regular health screenings, disease management education programs and fitness fairs, claim costs plummeted 19 percent, putting the county below average costs by other city and county payouts. For this effort, both NACo and TAC recognized Collin County for taking care of employees and saving taxpayer dollars.

View Past Features