MONTICELLO – Sullivan County Manager Joshua Potosek said the backlog of HEAP applicants that had gone unprocessed has subsided, but other issues within the county Division of Health and Family Services have surfaced.
Potosek is now investigating other issues that have cropped up in recent times.
“We are starting to look into what I am become aware of other issues and it is a little bit harder at this point, but it seems like the more and more things I’m looking at, that there are more and more problems,” Potosek said on Monday. “We are immediately going to be looking into all of these things and are already looking into some of the SNAP (food stamp) processes and potentially having the state come down to assist us with training and other things.”
The county manager did say that every time he brought up backlog issues
to Health and Family Services Commissioner Randy Parker, he was assured
there was no problem and that limited overtime was handling the workload.
On January 23, Potosek said he stepped in and mandated the commissioner seek volunteers for weekend overtime to address the backlog and if no volunteers were forthcoming, he was ready to mandate overtime in the Division of Family Services and to deploy resources from other county departments to address the situation.
Parker has been placed on administrative leave. Potosek could not speculate what the eventual outcome will be since Parker has retained an attorney.
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