(a) Generally. In performing its functions, the Board is expected to protect the merit system and to protect employee and applicant rights guaranteed under the merit system, including protection against arbitrary and capricious recruitment and supervisory actions, support for recruitment and supervisory actions demonstrated by the facts to be proper, and to approach these matters without any bias or predilection to either supervisors or subordinates. The remedial and enforcement powers of the Board granted herein must be exercised by the Board as needed to rectify personnel actions found to be improper. The Board must comment on any proposed changes in the merit system law or regulations, at or before the public hearing thereon. The Board, subject to the appropriation process, must establish its staffing requirements and define the duties of its staff.
(b) Personnel regulations. The County Executive must adopt personnel regulations under method (1).
The personnel regulations must provide the framework for:
(1) The classification of all merit system positions in the executive and legislative branches;
(2) Minimum qualifications for merit system positions, methods of determining qualifications and methods of selection for any positions;
(3) Probationary periods, promotions, transfers;
(4) Causes for removal from any merit system position and methods of removal, including demotions, furloughs, and reduction of staff. However, any regulations governing a reduction in staff and employee rights attendant thereto shall be restricted to the respective branch of government in which the employee is employed; in the case of the legislative and judicial branches, this sentence shall apply to employees hired by the legislative and judicial branch, respectively, after August 1, 1983.
(5) Annual, sick and other leave;
(6) Prohibitions against political activity;
(7) Maintenance of personnel records; and
(8) Similar personnel matters as may be provided by law.
(c) Classification standards. With respect to classification matters, the County Executive must provide by personnel regulation, adopted under Method (1), standards for establishing and maintaining a classification plan. These standards may include but are not limited to the following:
(1) The necessary components of class specifications;
(2) Criteria for the establishment of new classes, modification or elimination of existing classes;
(3) Criteria for the assignment of positions to classes;
(4) Kinds of data required to substantiate allocation of positions;
(5) Guidelines for comparing levels of job difficulty and complexity; and
(6) Criteria for the establishment or abolishment of positions.
The Board must conduct or authorize periodic audits of classification assignments made by the Chief Administrative Officer and of the general structure and internal consistency of the classification plan, and must submit audit findings and recommendations to the County Executive and County Council.
(d) Hiring persons with disabilities.
(1) Findings.
(A) Persons with disabilities are a largely untapped resource for outstanding candidates for County employment.
(B) There are many County residents with severe disabilities, including Wounded Warriors treated in the County at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.
(C) Persons with disabilities suffer from a high unemployment and underemployment rate in the County due in part to unfounded myths, fears and stereotypes associated with many disabilities.
(D) Hiring rules for persons with disabilities are necessary to remedy past discrimination resulting from these unfounded myths, fears, and stereotypes and to enable the County to be a model employer of qualified persons with severe disabilities.
(E) Special hiring rules for qualified persons with severe disabilities would permit the County to hire highly productive interns with severe disabilities into merit system positions.
(F) The Charter permits the County to operate a program within the merit system to recruit and select qualified individuals with severe physical and mental disabilities on a noncompetitive basis.
(2) The Executive must adopt by personnel regulation, under Method (1), standards for establishing and maintaining special rules for the initial appointment of a qualified person with a disability into a merit system position. These standards must:
(A) define a person with a disability eligible for a competitive appointment with a preference as:
(i) a person with medical proof of a developmental disability, a severe physical disability, or a psychiatric disability; or
(ii) a veteran rated by the Department of Veterans Affairs with a compensable service-connected disability of 30 percent or more;
(B) define a person with a severe disability eligible for noncompetitive appointment as a person with medical proof of a severe developmental, physical, or psychiatric disability; and
(C) require medical certification of a qualifying disability.
(3) Competitive appointment.
(A) Except as provided in Subsection (e), the regulation must establish and maintain a preference under the following order of preference:
(i) an employee who is unable to perform the employee’s job because of a disability or injury under the ADA;
(ii) an employee subject to reduction-in-force;
(iii) an employee who was granted a temporary disability retirement under the Employees Retirement System or an initial or temporary disability benefit of any type under the Retirement Savings Plan or the Guaranteed Retirement Income Plan but is no longer eligible for such a temporary disability retirement or benefit;
(iv) a veteran with a disability;
(v) an equal preference for a veteran without a disability and a non- veteran with a disability.
(B) This regulation must only apply the preference in Subparagraphs (A)(iv) and (A)(v) for the initial appointment of a qualified person to a merit system position who is among the highest rating category in a normal competitive process.
(4) Noncompetitive appointment. The regulation must establish and maintain standards for the noncompetitive appointment of a qualified person with a severe disability to a position in the merit system. The standards must:
(A) permit the noncompetitive appointment of a qualified person with a severe disability without advertising the position;
(B) require certification of a severe disability based upon medical evidence;
(C) apply only to the initial appointment of a qualified person with a severe disability to a merit system position; and
(D) require the person to successfully complete the appropriate probationary period for the position.
(e) Hiring Veterans for Uniformed Public Safety Positions.
(1) Findings.
(A) Veterans, particularly those returning from combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, suffer from a high unemployment rate.
(B) The skills and experience gained by veterans while in the military are helpful assets for serving in uniformed public safety positions.
(2) Regulation. The Executive must establish by personnel regulation, under Method (1), standards for a hiring preference point system for the initial appointment of a qualified veteran who applies for a merit uniformed public safety position in a normal competitive process. These standards must:
(A) define a veteran as a person who was honorably discharged or released from a branch of the United States armed services after at least 180 days of active military duty other than for training;
(B) define a veteran with a disability as a veteran rated by the Department of Veterans Affairs with a compensable service-connected disability of 30 percent or more;
(C) define a uniformed public safety position as a:
(i) police officer;
(ii) fire fighter/rescuer; or
(iii) correctional officer; and
(D) give preference points for a veteran and additional preference points for a veteran with a disability.
(f) Personnel regulation review. The Merit System Protection Board must meet and confer with the Chief Administrative Officer and employees and their organizations from time to time to review the need to amend these regulations.
(g) Adjudication. The Board must hear and decide disciplinary appeals or grievances upon the request of a merit system employee who has been removed, demoted or suspended and in such other cases as required herein.
(h) Retirement. The Board may from time to time prepare and recommend to the Council modifications to the County’s system of retirement pay.
(i) Personnel management oversight. The Board must review and study the administration of the county classification and retirement plans and other aspects of the merit system and transmit to the Chief Administrative Officer, County Executive and County Council its findings and recommendations. The Board must conduct such special studies and audits on any matter relating to personnel as may be periodically requested by the County Council. All County agencies, departments and offices and County employees and organizations must cooperate with the Board and have adequate notice and an opportunity to participate in any such review initiated under this section.
(j) Publication. Consistent with the requirements of State law, confidentiality and other provisions of law, the Board must publish, at least annually, abstracts of its decisions, rulings, opinions and interpretations, and maintain a permanent record of its decisions. (1979 L.M.C., ch. 24, § 2; 1982 L.M.C., ch. 40, § 5; 1984 L.M.C., ch. 12, § 1; 1984 L.M.C., ch. 24, § 39; 1984 L.M.C., ch. 27, § 23; 2010 L.M.C., ch. 2, § 1; 2012 L.M.C., ch. 25, § 1; 2013 L.M.C., ch. 1, § 2; 2015 L.M.C., ch. 23, § 1.)
Editor's note—Section 33-7 is cited in Montgomery County, Maryland v. Jamsa, 153 Md. App. 346, 836 A.2d 745 (2003); in Haub v. Montgomery County, 353 Md. 448, 727 A.2d 369 (1999); and in FOP, Montgomery County Lodge No. 35 v. Mehrling, 343 Md. 155, 680 A.2d 1052 (1996); See editor's note to § 33-5 for reference to § 33-7 in Montgomery County v. Anastasi, 77 Md. App. 126, 549 A.2d 753 (1988); Section 33-7 is cited in Robinson v. Montgomery County, 66 Md.App. 234, 503 A.2d 275 (1986); and Section 33-7(c) is mentioned in Montgomery County Department of Police v. Lumpkin, 51 Md. App. 557, 444 A.2d 460 (1982).
See County Attorney Opinion dated 10/30/98 indicating that the County may enact laws that require employees to allow a criminal background check as a condition of continued employment.
2015 L.M.C., ch. 23, § 2, states: Short Title. This Act may be cited as the “Veterans in Public Safety Employment Act.”
2013 L.M.C., ch. 1, § 1, states: Short Title. This Act may be cited as the “Expanded Hiring of Persons with Disabilities Act.”