Montgomery County Adding Six Figures

Montgomery County, a county known for being low on cash, will now be sending six figures, just about $260,000, which will go toward wellness and innovation chiefs on the same budget that has recently raised the taxes that homeowners in the area are stuck paying. The purpose of the wellness coordinator is to oversee the program that has been created to help improve both the physical and the mental health of employees who are working in the county. The person who reports to the human resources director about such mental and physical health will be receiving a salary of $110,000 each year and will also have full benefits.

The program has been designed to help employees to develop habits that are better for them, to help them live longer and healthier lives. The program is designed to teach these individual healthier eating habits, along with the benefits of exercise and how to get healthier by losing weight and giving up some bad habits, which would include learning to quit smoking. It is believed that this program will help benefit because when employees are healthier, the county can save money on the money that is spent on health care for the employees. The councilman of the county, George Leventhal, believes that the county will be able to save a fortune when the program is put to good use. The whole purpose of the program is to help the taxpayers save money. The county does not want to have to continuously up the price of taxes that the homeowners are stuck paying. With this program, Leventhal believes that residents of the area could save a whole lot of money.

It is also believed that when employers are healthier, they are far more productive than those who are not healthy and are actually quite ill. The spokesperson for Montgomery County Public Schools, Dana Tofig, agrees and says that when teachers are healthier, they make it to the job more often, meaning less substitutes needed. Tofig says that it is not sure if health care costs have been cut because the program is still relatively new and has not been used long enough for results to be seen just yet.

The president of the Montgomery County Taxpayers League, Joan Fidler, says that she understands why these two positions need to be created and does agree that it makes sense. But she also thinks that that county should be pushing these particular job functions in with other positions that already exist, instead of actually creating entirely new positions. A budget analyst for the Cato Institute, Tad DeHaven, believes that this plan only sounds like a waste of the taxpayer’s money. He does not think it is a good idea at all. He also pointed out that many of the health insurance companies offer programs for employees already, which is one of the primary reasons he feels that this is a waste.