Lauren McSherry has a story posted on the BOS vote to tighten requirements for county employees to receive tuition reimbursement in excess of $1,000. This is a move in response to Adam Aleman being granted more than $8,000 to cover the cost of classes only peripherally related to his work for the County. Aleman was arrested and charged in June with six felonies relating to his official duties. Aleman soon resigned from his position with San Bernardino County.

This move is a good first step, and is one that was advocated by your humble writer in a post last month. However, as McSherry writes, it would not affect tuition reimbursement below the $1,000 limit.

The issue here is that there are two interpretations of the intent of the tuition reimbursement system. One--the one favored by Aleman and Eyler--is that if education helps the employee in a general, non-specific sense, it should be covered by the County. The other stipulates that the education expenses must directly relate to official duties. For instance, I doubt anyone would have complained about Aleman being reimbursed for a hypothetical $500 class on expert-level property appraisal for taxation purposes (not a class covering the basic requirements to be an assistant assessor).

This change by the BOS makes it more difficult for a Postmus/Aleman situation to occur again, where there was clearly a personal friendship between the department head and the subordinate, and where the department head approved more than eight times the "standard" allowance for tuition reimbursement.

Here is the Sun's coverage of the story:

Tuition reimbursement rule tightened

Lauren McSherry, Staff Writer
Article Launched: 08/05/2008 10:56:39 PM PDT

Facing increasing scrutiny, the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors is tightening the requirements for county employees receiving reimbursement for their college education.

One month ago, a grand jury report faulted the county for paying for employees in the Assessor's Office to take college courses unrelated to their jobs.

On Tuesday, the board voted 3-0 to pass the new requirements. Supervisor Dennis Hansberger abstained, saying he had not had enough time to review the material. Chairman Paul Biane was absent.

Former Assistant Assessor Adam Aleman - who has been charged with six felonies, including falsifying documents and destroying evidence - received $8,000 last year for five college courses, including a class in ornithology.

Assessor Bill Postmus signed off on Aleman's requests worth $8,280 to take such classes at the University of La Verne as "Foundations of Business Ethics" and "Cultural and Gender Issues in Management."

Aleman may have been reimbursed more than 2.5 times more than any other county employee for education expenses - and at least eight times more than the average.

Under the new rules, employees who seek more than $1,000 in compensation must receive approval, not only from their department head, but from County Administrative Officer Mark Uffer.

Once an employee has been paid, the employee must complete two years of service with the county or return a prorated amount of money.

The new requirements, however, are not strict enough to prevent a second case that was highlighted in the grand jury report.

Postmus and Aleman approved spending nearly $1,000 for Taxpayer Advocate Gregory Eyler to take a course on European history and another on sociology at UC Riverside.

The grand jury report found that Eyler was even paid to attend college courses on county time.

Eyler recently earned a bachelor's degree in history with a minor in chemistry.

He said he had been considering becoming a history teacher, but more important, the degree was required to become a certified tax appraiser.

Write SB Pietas at sbpietas@yahoo.com.