Case No. 98CV5863 Plaintiffs' Opening Breif November 1998

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the Colorado Court of Appeals thought that the (then) DOP Director's use of public hearings in conjunction with a 3- member advisory panel in a similar matter were important safeguards. Blake v. Department of Personnel, Case No. 92CA1711, pp. 9 -10. [Record Vol. 15, pp. 7245 -46] In response to a request by James Lochhead, Executive Director of the Department of Natural Resources, to consider using data sets from the Watson Wyatt Data Services and the Mountain States Employers (copies of the two surveys were provided with the request), the DOP Director, after reviewing said surveys, stated in his letter of September 19, 1997, that "...the data available from the Watson Wyatt and Mountain States Employers Council is complete enough to use. " However, the DOP Director either ignored his own statement or misrepresented his intention and arbitrarily chose not to utilize the data. For the annual Total Compensation Survey [Record Vol. XV, pp. 7222 -33], the statutes are very explicit in the use of survey techniques, audits by the State Auditor, sources of data from comparable places of public and private employment and in appropriate competitive labor markets. However, here the DOP Director has ignored these requirements, in spite of a specific recommendation found in the FLA audit which states that "The DOP should search for additional sources to collect more data from the local labor market in gathering actual pay rates, or have a custom survey conducted of the local market if insufficient data is available. In order to conform to current guidelines as they are written, the custom survey could be conducted by a third party." [FLA Audit, p. 5, Record Vol. XV, p. 5188, ¶1] In a March 17, 1998 memo to the Office of State Planning and Budget, Joint Budget Committee, Jeffrey Schutt, Director, Human Resource Services, DOP, states that "...the Department agreed to have the salary data reviewed by an independent audit firm and would abide by the auditor's recommendation on data sufficiency." Contrary to the statutes as well as to its statement to the Joint Budget Committee, and a statement in the JEL- 98 -11, the DOP did not collect more data from the labor market and did not have a custom survey of the local labor market conducted and did not abide with recommendations in the audit. RELIEF SOUGHT The pro se Plaintiffs request that the Court hold unlawful and set aside the agency action, restrain enforcement of the system changes under JEL- 98 -11, order that individually named Plaintiffs and all similarly affected employees in the EPS and PSRS classes retain their position, including grade and title, order compensation for loss of step increases or any other annual increase, including interest; and award any other relief which is deemed appropriate. Respectfully submitted this 18t" day of November 1998. Janis Illian 9621 Lane Street Thornton, CO 80221 303/866 -3441 Page 8