I call this meeting of the House Finance Department
of Administration's Subcommittee to Order.
I'll let the record reflect that it is 4.24 p.m.
on Thursday, February 5th, 2026.
Present today, we have Representative Skirrick,
Story, Hymshoot, Holland, Vance, McCabe,
Allard, and myself, Chair Schruggi.
As we start, please remember to mute your cell phones,
and we've been joined by Representative St. Clear.
Welcome.
I want to thank our LIO moderator today,
Kyla Tepow, T-Pow.
T'Paw, thank you for helping us with
behind the scenes work for our committee.
I just asked her to pronounce it and then immediately butchered it.
My apologies.
Today, we will hear from the Department of Administration regarding
the budget request to-
decentralized the shared services of Alaska and transfer a portion of our payroll employees
out of the division of finance. Here today we have administrative services director Stephanie
Bingham. Welcome back. Thank you for being here. If you could please come up to the testifiers
table, put yourself on the record and begin with your presentation when you're ready.
Thank You.
Thank you very much for having me.
I am Stephanie the Administrative Services Director
for the Department of Administration.
Today I'll provide you an overview
of the realignment of shared services of Alaska.
Director Bingham, if you could just pull that microphone
a little bit closer for those of us who are hard of hearing.
Thank You.
So sorry.
All right, please continue director Bingham. Thank you.
Thank You through the chair.
My name is Stephanie Bingum.
I'm the administrative services director
for the Department of Administration.
Today I provide you an overview of the realignment
of shared services of Alaska and payroll functions
back to the department, including position transfers
and the impacts to employees.
This slide represents the shared
services for Alaska position transfer to overview.
A total of the 87 positions are transferring back to departments, 81 permanent full time, and 6 not in permanent.
Of the 77 positions transferred, Department of Administration Division of Finance will receive the largest share of positions.
Department transportation with 15 and vision gain with 7.
The remaining departments receiving 5 positions and are under are represented on the table shown.
The 87 position of the 87 positions 76 positions are filled and 11 are vacant any questions
Representative Carrick thank you through the chair. Thank you for being here again. It's Bingham. Are we
I apologize if I missed this right at the very top are we just looking at? The payroll positions on this slide
Director Bingum, thank very much through The Chair
Carrick, on this slide, this is the shared services of Laska.
So these are not the payroll positions, but the accounts
payable and the travel-related positions going back
to departments.
In future slides, I will go through the pay roll positions.
Follow-up representative Carick?
Follow up, yeah.
And I apologize.
I don't recall this.
But shared service is of Alaska, currently under.
And then I guess my fault, my real question is, I'm seeing transfers for DOA 24 positions and so I am just trying to figure out like where if shared service of Alaska is under Doa, then where are we transferring these folks to.
Thank you through the chair.
With these positions, they're just within a different RDU.
So Shared Services is its own RDu, which is the results delivery unit and its
own allocation within the budget.
They're moving out of that.
That will be eliminated.
And they'll be moving within this centralized admin services section.
Does that answer your question?
Great representative St. Clair.
Thank you through the chair.
A question on this slide.
You have 11 vacant positions within this organization.
Is that due to the hiring of freeze?
Thank you through the chair, Representative St. Clair, those positions are not necessarily
just due to the hiring freeze.
We currently do have some vacancies that we are holding vacant at this time with the
de-consolidation some departments would prefer to receive vacancies and hire those
positions themselves.
There were positions that were already vacant prior
to this decision being made that we were previously
we're recruiting for but we have halted
and we are working on the decentralization.
Okay, thank you.
Follow-up representative St. Clair?
Nope, that's good.
She answered it.
Very good, representative Story, did you have a question?
Thank you Chair Shoraki, you welcome Director Bingham,
it's going to see you again.
So I am trying to remember some history here
like in 2019, and you can help me that we went to this idea
to remove all the positions out of the various departments,
bring them together,
So, if I could have a little bit about the history,
when was it not working, when did we decide
to bring everybody back in the rationale,
and then how is that recorded within the knowledge bank
of DOA, so we don't, I'm sure so much
work and energy to move everything around and then to
move it back. And so I would hope it's documented about why we
decided to
move that back so the next administration coming
isn't going to want to do the same thing.
Director.
Thank you. Through the chair, Representative Storey, you are correct to
degree. I believe it was actually in about 2018 that it began. As far as all the history
that was before my time within this department, I can get you information as far
as the logistics and that information. But we are working in our project management team to
document what worked, what didn't work, so that we have that
And we will be documenting that for you.
Follow-up representative story?
Sure.
Thank you, through the chair.
Can you give me just a short synopsis of why we decided
to do this and go back?
What was what were you seeing that needed to be changed?
Thank you through the chair. I'm actually just going to jump to a couple of different notes that I have on their topic for you
So thank you very much
So when we talk about the decentralization this decision was really based upon feedback that the governor's office had received
Undopliddicive steps in existing processes
OMB did a survey back in September of 2025 and clearly the majority of the departments recommended that they were turned back
those positions for accounts payable
and travel at the department's request.
So that's the decision that has been put into the budget.
As far as the further history regarding it,
once again, I've been in my position for six months.
So I'm not as familiar,
but I'd be happy to follow up for you.
Any follow-up representative story?
Thank you, Chair Schraghi.
So the idea was it would bring efficiencies
consolidated and then it was found that it did not bring efficiencies and not
timely responses, still needed positions, and it needed to be moved back. At a
Director Bingham.
Thank you through the chair representative story.
The decentralization aligns the responsibilities
and the accountability by placing processes
and oversight with the departments
that originate and manage those transactions.
To my understanding, the duplicate processes
is really what's kind of guiding this here
is because there was
processes implemented that the departments have more visibility on within their department
to manage than within shared services and so there was portals and things initiatives
that they worked through to try and make efficiencies but really it became almost redundant and
All right, very good, Director, oh, one moment,
Director Bingham.
We've got another legislator wanting
to jump in the queue.
Rebecca, a representative, him, shoot.
Through the chair, director Bingam,
I jumped ahead in this slides, and there's
this notice of pay problems on page 8.
And I know we're going to get there,
so maybe my questions premature.
But is there a way to quantify the efficiency of payroll
from the employee side?
Numbers of times that there's an inaccuracy that has to be dealt with. Is that something that you're tracking?
Director thank you through the chair
Representative him too. I will get there and I actually did bring with me the director of finance with
Me, so she would best be suited at that time. Okay, sounds great. Thank you so much
Director Bingham. Why don't you continue the presentation? Thank You so
Okay, continuing on on slide three.
This slide represents the job classes in position counts by department.
I did not plan to go through each department specifically for the sake of time.
The types of job class is included or high level.
accountant, three, fours, and fives, accounting clerks,
accounting technician, one, twos and threes,
analyst programmers, a business analyst,
a Business Service Project Manager,
a data processing manager,
a division operations manager
loan collection officers,
and a project.
a program coordinator. As you can see on the slide, the Department of Administration,
Division of Finance retains the most diverse mix of positions as the Division
of finance continues to serve all agencies in their statewide role.
Thank you continuing on slide four. A total of 40 permanent full-time position.
Payroll positions are transferring back to the departments. This is in an overview of those positions by department
Department of Transportation and public facilities receives 17
positions Department Of Corrections receives eight and department of Fish and Game will receive six of these 27
Positions are filled and 13 are vacant. Any questions at this time?
Thank you
This is slide five, this is the payroll transfers by job class, as similar with what we did
with shared services of LASCA.
This, is an overview showing you the positions include human resource technician one, twos
and threes, payroll services supervisors, uh payroll service assistant manager, and
training specialists.
The Department of Transportation receives the largest mix, including multiple HR technician
Please continue
First slide six we are implementing
The purpose of this change we're implementing a strategic realignment of payroll and shared services functions to better support the department's missions and improve their service delivery
payroll services will decentralized for
Department of Law, Department military veteran affairs,
Department natural resources,
Department efficient game,
Department public safety,
Department corrections and Department
of transportation and public facilities.
Most of the shared services of Alaska
will be transferred to departments to assume responsibility
for all the accounts payable functions,
travel and expense reconciliation,
and reimbursement processes.
They originally transferred to support the shared services
of Laskett implementation at that time.
The remaining department of administration shared
services functions will be a realigned under the division
of finance and the Division of Administrative Services.
Questions?
Yeah, I guess for myself I'm curious, you talk a little bit
about the enactment here on this slide.
Director Bingham, can you talk to me just a little bit more
about how we actually improve, how are we structurally
improving service delivery, or what are the benefits
of this change?
Yes, through the chair, so my understanding is
that the departments will be able to take these transactions
back and work them quicker without having to transfer,
not transferize that we shouldn't use that word,
but without have to have someone.
third party in between their daily processing which should improve their
efficiency to get their transactions more timely processed within their own
accounting teams. I'll hold my other questions for now. Anyone else at
Representative Holland? Thanks to the chair I'm just curious as particularly on the
payroll position transfers in essence it appears that there's about 50% of the
vacant for most of the departments there and I'm curious how they've been functioning
with that vacancy and as they transfer the positions back is the intent to refill and try
and recruit and fill these positions or have we figured out that maybe these
able to function without them filled.
I'm just, I guess I am trying to understand, you know,
maybe how long these positions have been vacant.
If it's been, vacant for a long time,
then maybe rather than transfer them,
we need to just end them.
And if the work's not getting done,
so I, guess,
I was curious about the length of the vacancies
and is the intent once they're transferred
to immediately try and fill them?
Director Bingham, do you want to try to answer that the best you can?
Sure.
Sorry.
Through the chair, Representative Holland.
So with the payroll decentralization, the goal is to improve the areas for departments
that need that individual care.
We do struggle with a few things that I have represented on slide 8, and I do have the
These departments will receive those positions back and then we'll have the ability to recruit for those
Positions to hopefully improve that accuracy for themselves. We have struggled if we have continued to
Recruit for the positions. That's not an area where we've stopped recruitment and we are actually working
To continue to recruit that during this deconsolidation to make sure that we remain stable through deconsolidations
Representative Allard
This is my favorite part talking about vacancy positions.
So I'm going to go ahead and agree with Representative Holland here.
So, I know I can get it from OMB,
because we had just a flurry of vacant positions last year.
I think it totaled up to be almost $272 million.
So i'm very aware,
I believe the public is very
aware to you,
and I've only been here for a few months on smiling.
that have more than a year of vacancy, I would say,
would need to be brought back, turned in, closed down,
and then forces each department to come to the body,
the legislators in both bodies,
to ask for those positions back
because you're asking for money back.
And what's going on with the vacant positions,
they're using it as a slush fund,
expenditures in other areas.
And that means we don't really know where the money goes.
That means the taxpayers have no idea.
And yes, they're taxpayers.
So I'm going to request that we get every position from you
within the Department of Administration.
I'll see if I can beat you, get it from OMB.
With the position, I guess the PCN number as far as how long
it's been vacant.
The salary on it. Just the whole the hole slew across. I know it's a lot
But we'll see. All right. Thank you chair
And I think that was more of a request for information any comments that you want to provide at this time
To the chair, thank you very much chair Schruggie
Yes, representative aller. We can get you that information challenge accepted. Well, see who gets it first
what she say. Challenge except we'll see who gets it first. Can I do just one quick follow-up?
Yes, Representative Allard, follow up. Okay, did you roll your eyes? Did you? No, certainly not.
Because we're moving at a quick pace and so the sooner the better.
Okay. All right, thank you. You may have seen me look back at the record secretary, so
Thank you, Chair Swaghi. I would, through the chair, to the director, it would be helpful to me to, with these vacancies, I know, oftentimes there's stress on staff, and I can remember hearing from the payroll department in particular, how they've been working in a lot of overtime, not being able to...
If no one's there, we just can't tell the state of Alaska employees that no paycheck till Tuesday or something.
So I know that we've been working to try and do something with this department so there's some stability and we don't keep losing staff.
It seems like there must be a lot of stress or somethings going on, so at some point I would really appreciate a picture of what is...
What you're seeing with, and I could be wrong,
was that a different point in time,
are there high, are their tight time demands,
high workload without having extra personnel to help them?
It would just help me get a picture
of those positions too that Rep Allard's concerned about.
Director Bingham?
Through the chair, if you would like,
I can't have a vision director come on up
and discuss that with you if like.
Yes, please.
Okay, oh, it's Smith D'Nyski.
Director Dinesky for the record. Oh, it's about the nasty director of divisional finance. Yes, uh, through the chair shirt
Representative short
it
There's been some challenges with payroll. We all know there's
been challenges of payroll, right now we're sitting at a 38% vacancy with
payroll and they are working overtime to make sure that everybody gets paid and
I think there has been comments before that it's kind of a little bit of
a thankless job that they're really struggling under. There is a lot of
NOPPs and when people don't get paid they get really mad and
We have done a lot to try to improve it.
We've set up a portal for an OPPs.
We're monitoring them.
They're all coming in electronically now,
and we're addressing them, we have about,
I think there's a slide coming up about those.
So I probably will defer to that at a later time,
but they are doing quite a bit to
try and address the issues,
and there is still some vacancies,
but a lotta of it's turnover.
So we get somebody that comes in,
go through the process, they learn, and then they'll move up or they leave and
then we have vacancies and we'll have people coming in. So it's kind of a little
bit of our role-volving door. It is kind
of some of the lower level paid positions too.
So that kind tends to happen with the tech positions that we
have across the state in HR and in accounting.
Any follow-up representative story? Through the chair. I'll get one follow up.
OPP NOPPs yes, something if you could just clarify what those are to me
Director Nasky through the chair
Representative story those. Are a notice of pay problems?
So when somebody does not get paid properly
They would file one of those with the department and we'd be responding in the to those
Thank you director Dinesky any follow-up representative story. I yes follow up
And it's coming back to me now more about the situation that there was like
Sometimes a major time leg to get the notice of paid problem completed
like month more to
Get that completed is that still happening or do we have a quicker time turn around on that director to Nesky?
through the chair, it has been addressed a little bit,
but there is still a bit of a lag with it
because of the vacancy.
So I think there might be a slide that addresses
kind of time periods on where we're at right now.
A majority of ones that are outstanding
have been received in the last couple of months.
There was kind a backlog that we had a couple years ago
and all of those have addressed.
Thank you.
Very good.
I'm not seeing additional questions at this moment. Please continue director
Thank you through the chair just representative Schoggy. I'll continue on slide seven
This is the impact on employees. There will be no change to employee job classes or salary ranges prior to the transfer
Positions will been realigned to new reporting structures within the agency they better
that they will be supporting.
Duty stations are filled positions.
A filled position will not be moved,
though the vacant positions could be filled
in different duty locations.
Employee supervisors and office locations
may have to change.
The departments receiving those positions,
the departments are receiving the positions
that the originally transferred from
their department two shared services.
The departments will need to review their positions
and determine if reclassifying positions
and restructuring them will support their needs
within their Department.
Any questions?
Okay, through the chair,
Senator, Representative Shroggy, my apologies.
This is the payroll decentralization current challenges, and I believe this it will actually get to representative stories, questions on the NOPP backlog.
Payroll has a 38% vacancy rate with 25 of the 65 positions vacant.
Work continues through the available staff, prioritized processing and limiting, sorry, an automation.
So with the backlog, there was 2,349 notice of pay problems.
Those are the NOPPs that Elizabeth had referenced.
Those have been resolved since they began in 2023 and about 330 of them remain.
This represents a steady state for NMPPs and is no longer considered a backlog.
payroll is continual, this does not fully go away and the process is a bit cyclical in nature.
Departments with one or two payroll staff will need to assess their internal processes and assign,
assign and cross train staff or supervisors to provide the secondary review of all payroll runs.
and the centralized oversight to ensure payroll staff apply union contracts and
letters of agreements consistently across all department all departments
questions please continue director my apologies representative Carrick has a
question and we've been re-joined by representative Vance thank you through
wondering about the 330 that are currently open and is that if you know what was the average we've
had over that time I know we have had since 2023 2349 notices but are we above the
average or below the coverage that we had during this period of time where we
Through the chair, Representative Carrick,
can I ask a clarifying question?
Are you referring to like how many revolving in average
are coming in because this represents
kind of the steady state where we're at
and the backlog was kind a big backlog.
So are you looking for the average
over that two year period?
Yes, through the chair. So I guess I'm, I am trying to get a sense of is 330 of higher amount than say the peak of the backlog or is it a lower amount and and further,
I would ask is in an ideal state. I know we will always have a few notice of pay problems happening, but are we back to an
what would be sort of a more acceptable number.
Thank you.
Thank You through the chair.
Representative, I'm actually going to let Elizabeth
take this one because this is her team.
So I think she can give you that direct information on that.
For the record, Elizabeth and Askey Division Director
for Division of Finance.
Yes.
It's hard to quantify that because we haven't been automatically keeping track of them.
They were coming in as paper and they were being managed through paper before the automated
system that we established a couple of years ago, so it's kind of hard say, yes, we're
doing better now than we were before.
There definitely seems to be, since we've been tracking this automatically, a decrease in the
amount we're seeing, but we still do get occasional NOPPs if people don't get paid on Wednesday.
which is not the payday. It's Friday. So we do get occasional times where we get those coming in
and have to address them. Usually those are ones that we can go in and address really quickly,
but there's ones who come in that are a little more complicated. Everybody
wants to kind of work on knowing what to get paid and looking at the bargaining units and
trying to understand that. Sometimes we got questions about, hey, I think I should get
interpretation of the contract. Thank you director Dineski any follow-up
representative Kerrick yes follow up through the chair it's sort of an
unrelated question but last year we heard from the payroll director that one of
the biggest challenges during the backlog was the paper system and we even heard
from payroll division employees that were
bringing boxes of people's payroll information which had identifying information home with them
and bankers boxes to process while working from home, which was super extraordinary to me.
So one thing I'm curious about is with the move to the online system, do we still have employees
bringing physical copies of payroll, information anywhere with
through the chair. I don't believe that is occurring. There is like everything's
electronic and we are pushing electronic as much as possible for
streamlining and trying to create efficiencies and also automating as
much we can so that shouldn't be occurring one final follow-up thank you
through-the-chair. The other thing we had heard
I think two years ago now and tried to rectify as a legislature was payroll staff were getting
backlogged because they didn't actually have the equipment they needed to do the job, namely
two different monitors to pull up the three or four different items they need to process
one person's payroll at a time and the legislature approved and enacted the provision of monitors
Now that those are there, do we still have equipment
or hardware challenges for Division of Payroll
and does that contribute at all to the backlog
we've still had?
Director?
Through the chair.
No, we have gotten those additional monitors
and they have touch screen computers
that they all got issued.
So that has been helping tremendously
with their processing.
So I do not believe technology is an issue
for getting things processed.
Great, thank you.
I believe I saw a question from Representative Hymshoot and then I've got
Vance after that. Thank you Chair Shargy through the chair. This is what I was
asking about in terms of impacts to the employees. My other question is this
whole process that you guys have gone through of centralizing and
then decentralizing all of this. What is the financial cost of that over the
years? It hasn't been something that just happened and it didn't cost anything.
Thank you through the chair.
With this decentralization that's currently occurring,
there is, it is not, there's no delta for us.
The departments will have to look and see
if there was a difference within what they were paying us
for those services and the positions
that they're receiving back,
and they'll have adjust accordingly.
Follow-up.
Thank-you through-the-chair.
So.
Is there any other data that has been collected or should be collected like is our is
our best quantifier of this the NOPPs or is there something else we should
be asking you that as been problematic for employees the
N OPP is the measure. Thank you through the chair.
Representative Hymn-Shoot, I believe that is the quantifier that has been predominantly
discussed over the last few years.
To my knowledge, there's not another measure.
I will let Elizabeth chime in if she thinks there is anything, but I don't.
I think that's our primary driver.
Can I see director Danaski nodding her head?
Yeah, I guess I was just thinking about,
did anybody have their insurance laps,
or did any benefits issues,
or anything that would go along with payroll,
or this was specifically the money in your bank account,
not any of the other benefits or packages that people have.
For the record, Danasci.
For their record.
Oh, Elizabeth Danosci, yes, there has been
NOPP's file for benefit issues and we generally have to work with retirement and benefits
who administers our benefits to address those kind of issues.
Okay, in the world of teaching you would have a apologies, yeah.
You would a teaching certificate lapse and then that triggers that your
ters accrual stops and that kind thing, but an N OPP captures all of that.
It's not just money. Okay. Thank you. I was not very direct with my question, so thank you
Very good. Representative Vance and then I've got representative story. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman. My question is on slide nine, but it aligns with the
questions of Chair Kerrick. It says on line nine the third bullet,
standardizing payroll through software remains under consideration. Can you help
explain what you mean by that statement? Because I thought we'd already addressed
that. So what else is needed in his under
consideration? Director.
Thank you through the chair, I just switched slides for everyone, so where it is just so that we can all see what's being represented.
So, to my understanding, Elizabeth has addressed some of that as we've already spoken.
There was an idea of a statewide diamond attendance system to further push that forward,
modernizing the system even more. However, with the de-consolidation efforts currently underway, that
is a much larger project than what the department is currently able to do,
and we're trying to make sure that we are very right-sized with our projects,
and that, we take on projects that can effectively do in the right amount of time,
while still providing the same level of service, and not overstating those projects.
Any follow-up?
Well, I think my follow up is for you, Mr. Chairman, about having,
I believe it be OIT that would be implement that if I'm, no?
Okay, I want to know more about that because I know that just getting things automated and
more universal does help on efficiency and when I better understand that. I
know obviously for this time we don't have time to go into that but I think that's definitely
Thank you for that representative Vance. I know in last year's budget requests
some of that was being considered and ultimately not advanced under our current fiscal environment, but I
Guess as a follow-up to your question.
I'm curious does this decentralization process impact our ability to
Further digitize or automate our time in attendance and payroll services in the future
Any response to that director. Thank you through the chair representative
So I'll take both of your questions. I think simultaneously
We do still want to automate more. We're just trying to right-size that to make efficiencies that are realizable
within the next year
The reality is the automation project was for all departments and we are going to scale that back
We are gonna still consider it over time
But we're looking to do smaller scale things with the money that is available to us if we
can where Elizabeth could talk a little bit more.
We would like to still do an AI chat
bot that potentially could take those marketing units.
And I believe this was discussed previously.
And it would aid the payroll staff
and be able to automate through some of what
those very technical and legal terms are
and make that a more efficient process for them.
Elizabeth, do you have anything to add?
Further, I could Elizabeth Donasky.
Yeah, we are kind of underway with a chat bot that we were going to be using to kind
of help the new payroll staff with and standardized interpretation of the contracts and letters
of agreement, which are modifications of those contracts. So that is underway right now,
and we're trying to scope it out and try to get the language into the database for it so we can
One more follow-up.
I'll follow up.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Just for clarification.
So with this, the standardizing payroll, since you're decentralizing, would each department
then have to adopt separately this software and create, generate separate fiscal notes
then within their departments?
the time sheet. Director. Through the chair, no, we're planning on hosting this on teams,
Microsoft Teams, and it'd be available for everybody to have access to across the state. So,
and we'll be looking at Division of Finance funding it. Okay, thank you. I'd like to ask
a clarifying question. What is the timeline for implementing the AI chat bot that's going to be
across teams. And then my second question is if that's underway, what parts of the automation
are still under consideration?
To the share, yeah, that is underway.
We're kind of working out the timeframe for it.
We have to kind engage with Microsoft
to get the platform for, to, get it going.
So it's going to be probably a couple more months.
I don't have a set timeline quite yet for.
So hopefully before the end of the year
that's kind what we're shooting for
and then other initiatives that we are thinking about.
We've talked about time and attendance systems
and we've talk about what
we can do to do more with just automating
processing of time sheets too, so we can push that a little bit further.
So we're still looking into that and seeing what we
can do with the more simplified time-sheets.
And then one additional clarifying question you talked earlier in response to, I believe,
Representative Vance's questions about a lack of capacity in trying to right-size your modernization projects.
Is the limitation financial or is the limitations person power and the ability to actually have people implement?
Thank you through the Chair, Representative Shoggi.
It's a great question.
Currently right now with the decentralization,
departments are receiving it back.
So that time and attendance project
in that initiative last year was statewide.
With that.
The time and attendance aspect would be on those complex bargaining units that those individual
department service like Department of Transportation has very complex timekeeping processes.
With that, they would responsible for their own, the time in attendance that we would
be looking to do would for the smaller agencies that are continuing to service.
And I believe we've automated about 7,500 timesheets across the state line.
So there's more efficiencies that can be gained there.
forward and get through this decentralization, we'd be looking at where we could further
improve, but we're trying to keep it manageable with the workload that we currently have.
And then Representative Storey, did you have a question before we wrap up this last line?
Sure. Thank you, Chair Schraghi. And it was something, and I'm not sure through the chair,
who can best answer this, but I believe someone was speaking and said with as far as the turnover
went, we had, it may be, tech one positions, county one position, that turned over frequently.
Once they were trained, they moved up and took a different job,
low compensation where they would move and with the salary study that was
processed, I know usually to do a reclassification you have to go through
all these levels and it takes some time. With the salaries study can you use it
if that shows that's
Those jobs are not at adequate compensation compared to the indicators that was in the study that you can use that as
Something to guide your future
Ranges of salary
Thank you through the chair representative story
The department does over we we do work it with I mean personally I work with division of personnel
I know that
Director Daniski also does, that's always a consideration but with the
salary study that is really within the division of personnel to manage it and
kind of implement and look at all the classifications and all
the positions that fall within there so it would be in coordination and that
would reviewed over time.
Yes, and representative story. Yes. One of the things we learned in finance this last week is that the salary study is unable to be implemented without a reclassification study across state government. And so they're trying to re classify positions throughout
please your follow-up. Thank you for that. I was just saying as far as through the chair,
as FAR as making requests, that is something you would have to do to request to another department
that this is a great need in order to not be spending money on retraining people and
wanting them to keep their knowledge that they've learned in their position.
Thank you through the chair.
That is within our department division of personnel
falls within the department of administration.
So we do work closely with them,
but that's not a singular,
like we can advocate and have conversations obviously,
but we're not the only department
that would be affected by that.
And so that all agencies within those job classes
would affected.
And there's a real budgetary aspect to that
Not seeing any other immediate questions. I know we're on the last slide
But you did not get a chance to really cover this slide from your perspective
Would you like to finish on this line and then I suspect it'll be some additional questions director
Thank you. Through the chair representative, I will continue on slide nine.
This is the payroll decentralization in future improvements.
I believe we've covered most everything on here, but I'll go through it.
Returning payroll positions to departments is expected to improve coordination and
response time by aligning payroll processes with personnel actions through timelines.
Though timelines will still depend on their workloads.
be complex union rules, but by placing the payroll closer to the department, human resource
and management is expected to improve communication and reduce those avoidable
We are reconsidering, as mentioned, we are re-considering
the payroll standardization software
and reevaluating state-wide time and attendance
as we work through the de-consolidation
re stabilization efforts.
The department aims to manage appropriately sized projects
with realistic expectations and timelines
while we adapt to staffing changes.
Very good, thank you Director.
There are additional questions from the committee.
If we could go back to slide eight, please for a moment, Director Bingham, on slide two.
Excuse me.
Slide eight bullet two, a department with one or two payroll staff will need to assess
their internal processes and assign cross-trained staff or supervisors to provide a second review
Who's responsible for the cross-training? Is that done through you or?
Can you speak to how that is going to be implemented and you'll make sure that there are those internal controls for payroll?
Thank you very much through the chair representative shaggy
We are working with all departments to ensure that we do not have you know failures due to deconsolidation
So Elizabeth's team it
our Director Denysky's team is working very, very closely with these departments as we move forward.
We are just now starting those individual one-on-one department approaches as
we talk with them about their needs. They'll receive one position, maybe two, but that doesn't
make a full payroll team. they'll need to look at their current structure, reassess and kind of
payroll team that is existing will continue to provide those services in the multi-levels
of certification needed.
Another thought that comes up in terms of this decentralization I've in my life prior
to the legislature have spent considerable time working in very small teams.
and small teams have trade-offs.
You get to know everyone very well
and coordinate very closely.
I know that it can also be very problematic
when someone has an injury, an illness,
or is otherwise taken out of the workplace
when you have a small team that work is shifted
onto an even smaller team.
Can you speak to, through this decentralization process,
are these small things going to be capable
and accurate fashion consistently throughout the year, or do you expect that there would be
challenges with that? And to the extent there are challenges, are there any proposed remedies or
ways to mitigate those challenges that come with smaller teams? Would you provide your perspective on
Thank you very much through the chair. It's a valid perspective. We are working with the
agency is to try and make sure that's prevented as much as possible. They have to my understanding
they're all looking at their organizational structure, seeing what staffing loads are and
trying to make that there are multiple contacts associated in each department. Their human resource
at each department that's receiving it, they are working with the admin services directors
and we'll start helping them set up those teams and work very closely with them.
In the meantime, the Division of Finance payroll team will continue to provide those services
and if there are single points of failure, as you mentioned, that will be addressed and
I do want to maybe just take a moment to read for the committee part of the reason stated
for original consolidation of payroll services.
The primary goal of standardizing and streamlining business processes, excuse me, the primary
goal would be standardising and streamlined business process, reducing costs, improving
I don't know what to make of the fact that now just a few years later we're
reversing that and it does make me wonder are we decreasing efficiency, degrading
service quality and fragmenting business processes. I mean it seems to me if the
goal in centralizing was to realize those benefits and now we are reversing
Sorry, through the chair, Representative Shoggy, it's before my time.
I apologize I can get back to you with more information if you would like, but I
can't speak to then and now, I could speak
to the now and that we have a real problem that
we're trying to address and working with the agencies to kind of change the
state it has been in the last few years.
I guess my follow-up, thank you for that.
I just guess the follow up question would be
I understand you're in a difficult role of being new to your position and to state service
who is assisting you in
Understanding what occurred during that original centralization so that you can avoid some of the challenges
Or problems that have occurred as a result of that centralizing process
Is there anyone or who has that experience in your area?
Thank you through the chair or representative Shruggi every time
We are working very collaboratively across our divisions. This is not something that's new payroll used to be in division of personnel
There's still a lot of people there that you know can provide those services and that guidance payroll itself is a wealth of knowledge for us
And we do work closely with them
I'm sitting here with the director and we are work in collaboratively to understand those things and kind of
provide guidance to the new ones coming in I recognize that I am very new but I do
take it very seriously. Director Danasky can you remind me how long you've been in
your position were you there for the original centralization process further
I might have been, but I think I was in a different position.
I've been with the state for more than 15 years.
I always in the division of finance for about eight years
and had a kind of a little stand of going around
to a couple of other departments.
So I vaguely remember it, I thing,
but wasn't involved in it before.
Fair enough.
I realize I'm asking things that you probably
are unable to provide insight on at this time.
reinforced my concern, however, that we have repeatedly looked to consolidation and streamlining
to improve government efficiency and deliverability of services. And I don't know that they've worked
successfully navigate another substantial change that I don't know that was very successful in
the first place when we were going the other direction. So I understand you guys are doing
some difficult work, but I'm concerned with another, substantial, change without a significant
amount of experience to guide you all through that process. But I wish you luck in that
process and look forward to further discussions on this matter. Any last
Representative story. I thank you chair shruggi a comment really the first one is I too
Will really like hearing more?
Maybe speaking with someone who's had more history about the processes and now we're going back to them and I
Think it's really important that we know that and understand that because we want to be as efficient as possible and
We really want know we don't want go back
To make an errand I understand you know some of the
contracts are really complex and we wouldn't want to move one from DOT or
assigning how much you work on this project and you know you've braced your
employee from different grants and things like that.
So I don't have that, but anyway, good to know.
And then I just wanted to pass on my thanks
to everyone working there to deliver payroll
and all the other things that your department does
because it is very much appreciated by this group.
And I know it's been stressful and I'm hoping that
what you're working on will get us to a spot where we have employees that are satisfied with
their work and that their goals are attainable. So thank you. Director Bingham, did you have
a final comment before we adjourn? Yes. Thank you very much through the chair.
I just want to point to just one positive example,
AMHS did transfer their payroll back to, sorry,
the Alaska Marine Highway System,
transferred their paywall back
to Department of Transportation Public Facilities
a few years ago, and that has been successful
and not the model for us.
So as we look at this, we are looking at
what successes we've gained where
and working with departments to make sure
that we can gain those same efficiencies for them.
Director Bingham, Director Danaski, thank you both very much for being here.
Please extend our appreciation to your payroll teams.
We do know that they are doing some pretty difficult work in difficult circumstances
and they're a huge part of our state and we appreciate them, so thank
you. With that, we are adjourned at 5.17 pm.