Court Opinion

ID: 9614570
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:26:30.948621+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:03:37.189728
License: Public Domain

BAKES, Justice,
concurring specially:
I concur in all of the majority opinion except that portion which agrees with the decision of the Personnel Commission which concluded that I.C. § 67-5309(n) and the commission rule promulgated thereunder do not permit the discharge of an employee for inefficiency or incompetency in the performance of duties, merely for failure to attain the productivity standards of the agency. The Personnel Commission was of the opinion that an employee cannot be judged solely on the quantity of his performance. While I agree with the commission that quality should be considered in each case, no agency should be required to retain an employee who is unwilling or unable to meet a reasonably established minimum level of performance. I believe the commission’s view in this regard is erroneous as a matter of law.
However, there was substantial, albeit conflicting, evidence that the cause for the employee’s failure to meet productivity was the result of the agency’s failure to schedule sufficient audits, and accordingly I concur on that basis.1 It would be far better if this Court were to remand this case to the Personnel Commission for reconsideration, with the instruction that “inefficiency and incompetency” may be established by the failure of an employee to meet reasonably established productivity levels of performance, regardless of the quality of the work which the employee does in fact perform.

. The commission’s determination that the employee’s failure to meet the productivity levels was caused in part by the failure of the agency to schedule sufficient audits is somewhat contradicted by the commission’s own established minimum qualifications of a "compensation insurance payroll auditor," which the commission describes on page 2 of its decision and order as including, among other things, the ability to "work independently in arranging appointments for audits and follow up.”