Title
The hiring of an additional Weed Inspector for the Agricultural Services Department
Recommendation
That Parkland County Council approve the hiring of an additional weed inspector in the Agriculture Services Department with funding to be allocated at spring budget adjustments.
Body
Purpose
The Agricultural and Rural Life Advisory Committee discussed at the January 25,2012 meeting the potential benefits of adding a fifth Weed Inspector in order to reduce the work load for the other inspectors and allow for more properties to be inspected on a annual basis.
Summary
At the Agricultural and Rural Life Advisory Committee meeting on January 25,2012 the weed inspection program in the County was discussed. The discussion centered around why on a yearly basis there are properties that do not get inspected. The information provided to the committee was based on the 2009 Census results. Parkland County has one Weed Inspector for every 7522 residents and each Weed Inspector has 4588 parcels of land to inspect in a four month term of employment. Over that four months the Weed Inspector works approximately 693 hours. This means that in order to inspect all of the properties in their area they need to inspect 6.6 properties per hour. This does not include the time required to follow up on complaints, issue weed notices, follow up on these notices and to carry out the enforcement when necessary.
At the end of the discussion the Committee felt that the addition of a Weed Inspector would help to reduce the workload of the other Weed Inspectors and would help to increase the number of properties that get inspected.
The cost to hire an additional weed inspector has been calculated to be $23,000. This includes wages, benefits, the cost of a vehicle as well as a laptop computer.
note: The laptop computer is not an additional cost as the department will use existing funds allocated for computer purchases from the existing equipment replacement reserve.
Administrative...
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