Commissioner Tom Sorel announced some changes to the department’s organizational structure Jan. 3, which is headlined by the departure of Khani Sahebjam, deputy commissioner and chief engineer. Bernie Arseneau, former Policy, Safety & Strategic Initiatives Division director, will replace Sahebjam.

Sahebjam is leaving the department after 20 years of state service for a job in the private sector.

“It has been a very gratifying job the past three years working as deputy commissioner and chief engineer,” Sahebjam said. “The main goal that the commissioner had when we came on board three years ago was to regain the public’s trust and confidence and get us out of where we were—I think we are there now.”

Sorel outlined various other changes or “refinements” as he called them, which include changes in the division director and commissioner’s staff areas.

“We feel what we’ve had in place the past few years has worked out very well for the department,” Sorel said. “We want to continue that basic structure of the organization.”

One of the areas that will remain the same is the six-division structure, although there will be some new faces and movement in director roles.

Nick Thompson will fill the Policy, Safety & Strategic Initiatives Division director role vacated by Arseneau. Thompson has served the department in a number of roles, most recently as Policy Analysis, Research & Innovation director, where he led the department’s E-magination JAM and Urban Partnership Agreement efforts.

Jon Chiglo, who most recently served as acting director for the Office of Technical Support, will lead the Engineering Services Division. Chiglo is also known for his role as design-build project manager for the Interstate 35W Bridge Replacement project in Minneapolis.  

The other four division director roles also will be retained, with Julie Skallman staying on as State Aid Division director and Tim Henkel resuming his role Modal Planning & Program Management Division director.

Sue Mulvihill is set to lead the Employee & Corporate Services Division after a 1 ½-year stint as Operations Division director, while Mike Barnes former Engineering Services Division director, will replace Mulvihill as Operations Division director.

“We have made a point of trying to rotate some of the division directors in order to garner and gain some background skills and leadership they have learned in one division area and utilize those in another area,” Sorel said.

The commissioner’s staff will remain much the same, with many of the current directors retaining their roles, including;

• Scott Peterson, Government Affairs
• Betsy Parker, Chief Counsel
• Kevin Gutknecht, Communications
• Rebecca Fabunmi, special assistant to the commissioner/deputy commissioner and chief engineer
• Dan Kahnke, Audit

The only changes to the commissioner’s staff include the addition of Pam Tschida, former Employee & Corporate Services Division director, and Ginny Crowson, who most recently directed the Office of External Partnering.

Tschida, who plans to retire in May, will serve as acting Chief Financial Officer. One of her duties will be to make sure the organizational structure of the Office of Finance is properly aligned with the rest of the organization. Crowson will lead the newly created Office of Customer Relationship Management.

Additionally, Deb Ledvina will continue to serve as transportation ombudsman.

The revised organizational chart is available at www.dot.state.mn.us/information/orgchart.html.

By Peter Zuniga, Office of Chief Counsel

Four social media sites opened to all employees Jan. 3—Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Linkedin. These sites are no longer blocked by filters, which means employees will be able to access them from work computers.

Mn/DOT recently adopted a social media policy for the appropriate use of these sites. In addition, Employees should remember that the department is subject to the Minnesota Government Data Practices Act, which regulates all data maintained and disseminated by government entities and provides access to the public.  

“The presumption is that all data Mn/DOT maintains are public unless a state or federal law makes the data not public,” said Barbara Forsland, Data Practices compliance and policy analyst. “The department must keep all data it maintains in a readily accessible fashion and allow for either inspection of the data or provide copies of the data.”

Top five things employees need to know when using social media

1. Only post public data—Never post data that are not public. Pay careful attention when posting data about other employees. Mn/DOT’s data practices website features a list of what data are public about employees—anything not on the list is considered private data. 
   
   
2. All Mn/DOT business related data, regardless of whether it is posted in a personal account or business account, are subject to the MGDPA and discovery requests in litigation. If it is business related and requested, the employee will have to produce it. To any and all extents possible, employees should separate personal accounts and business accounts.
   
   
3. If an employee uses their state e-mail address or department-owned electronic resources to establish accounts, access or post comments to social media, other people at Mn/DOT may have access to that information.—“Stop , think about it, and ask yourself if you really want an attorney going through your personal information to find government data subject to a data practices request or a discovery request,” Forsland said. 
   
   
4. Establish a retention schedule for business data posted on social media sites and adhere to it. If Mn/DOT doesn’t have the data because the retention schedule allowed it to be deleted, then the department can’t and doesn’t have to produce it.
   
   
5. Be mindful of the security risks associated with social media. Not only are employees jeopardizing personal information, they are subjecting the department to the same risks. Be familiar with Mn/DOT’s Information Technology Do(s) and Don’t(s) and follow them.

For more information, visit ihub.dot.state.mn.us/datapractices/.

By Cindy Peick, Office of Financial Management

This will not be the last winter of snow and ice, but it will be the last winter for the Minnesota Accounting and Procurement System and Statewide Automated Materials Management System, as they will be replaced by the Statewide Integrated Financial Tools system. 

With six months left until implementation, Mn/DOT’s TranSWIFT Project Team and work teams continue to work toward replacing MAPS, the state’s current financial and procurement system. The new system, known as SWIFT, will include features and functionality that aim to help users complete their financial, procurement and inventory processes easier and more efficiently. 

Currently, a procurement and inventory work team within the TranSWIFT project is leading the department in the use of SWIFT to manage the variety of procurement and inventory activities. The work team is headed up by Craig Gardner, Office of Administration, and Jim DeGonda, Office of Administration.

Gardner and DeGonda said the SWIFT system offers users new functionality and tools to streamline their procurement and inventory processes.

“Reconciliation between procurement and inventory will become much easier and more efficient than it was between MAPS and SAMMS,” Gardner said. “For example, item prices will automatically be adjusted upon voucher payment instead of previously having to adjust the price or process expenditure corrections.”

“The ‘punch-out‘ shopping baskets also are a great feature,” Degonda added. “They will allow users to order directly from select vendor managed catalogs and automatically create a purchase order.”

Additional functionality and online self-service tools that will benefit users include:

• Purchasing change orders will be much easier to process and will save time
• Automated dispatching of purchase orders – no need to scan and e-mail purchase orders to vendor
• Ability to attach documents to purchase orders

The TranSWIFT Project Team is working directly with offices to ensure a smooth transition. Closer to the implementation date, the team will provide more information on other areas of the system, as well as the training and support that will be available to future SWIFT users.

For more information about the TranSWIFT project, including project status, schedule and updates, visit ihub/transwift/ or contact Bill Roen, TranSWIFT project director, at 651-366-4076.

By Kristen Zschomler, Cultural Resources Unit

The Bridge Office and Cultural Resources Unit recently launched a new website about Minnesota’s historic bridges and steps that are being taken to preserve them. The site includes:

• Information about Mn/DOT’s previous bridge studies and surveys
• Images of numerous state and local bridges
• Recent examples of rehabilitation projects on historic bridges
• Commitments under a Programmatic Agreement that help streamline the Section 106 historic review process and preserve 24 of Minnesota’s premier state-owned bridges
• Management plans for the 24 state-owned bridges

In addition, the website will feature historic images of unknown Minnesota bridges from the collection of Marty Herbers, a long-time Bridge Office employee who retired in 1994.  

Herbers left behind a legacy for people interested in Minnesota’s engineering history. Throughout his tenure with the department, he visited county museums and public works departments all over the state, collecting materials on bridges with hopes of someday writing a book on the subject. 

Herber’s collection includes numerous early county files from days prior to the creation of the Minnesota Highway Department when counties were responsible for highways. These files contain information on Minnesota’s earliest bridge building endeavors. The acquisition of these files has created a unique collection, which will soon be archived with the Minnesota Historical Society. 

Numerous images are included in Herber’s collection. However, several of the images are old black and white photos of unknown bridges. In the next few months, the photos will be posted on the new website. Employees who think they know information about any of the bridges will be able to submit their guesses to the Bridge Office at that time. 

To learn more about Mn/DOT’s historic bridge program, visit http://www.dot.state.mn.us/historicbridges/index.html.

By Beth Petrowske

Mn/DOT employees from around the state generously donated gifts of food, toys and money to several charities during the holiday season. Fundraising efforts varied greatly by district.

District 4 hosted its annual Hospice Charity Potluck & Raffle that raised a record-high $1,665, which was matched by the Otto Bremer Foundation. Since the raffle’s inception in 1995, District 4 has raised a grand total of $14,288.

District 3-St. Cloud employees hosted their fourth Annual Toys for Tots Holiday Dinner, sponsored a raffle and accepted donations of money and toys that brought in 155 toys and $1,503 in charitable funds. Their colleagues in District 3-Baxter raised and donated:

• $835 and toys for the local Salvation Army Toys for Kids Drive
• $160 for the local Brainerd Lakes area food shelf at a hot dish lunch
• 29 pints of blood through a blood drive

District 6 gathered three buckets full of toys, two bikes and cash donations during their annual Toys for Tots drive.

Employees in District 7 and AFSCME Local 280 completely filled a motor pool van with 271 pounds of food, paper products and cleaning and hygiene supplies for the ECHO Food Shelf. In addition, the Hiwayan Club and employees donated $72 in cash.

The Wellness Committee in District 8-Willmar sponsored a guessing contest to collect money and food for the Willmar Area Food Shelf. Employees could buy chances to win jars of bean or pasta soup mix by guessing the number of beans or pasta in each jar. The contest and drive generated donations of more than 100 pounds of food.

In the Metro District and Central Office, employees rekindled their giving spirits as well.

The Office of Materials and Road Research in Maplewood adopted four families for the holidays through the Volunteers of America.

“Each family we adopted gave us a list of the specific gifts each family member wanted,” said Lisa Bilotta, Office of Materials and Road Research administrative assistant. “We asked employees to contribute and we had a huge response. Employees purchased items from the lists and put them in one of four large boxes we set out for each family. Some employees donated money so that we could purchase the things that were still needed.”

Bilotta said they were able to give at least three gifts to each person in addition to giving each family $40-$60 in grocery store gift cards.
  
The annual Central Office Silent Auction sponsored by the Office of Construction and Innovative Contracting raised $1,094 for Second Harvest Heartland. MAPE Local 801 contributed $2,000 and the Hiway Federal Credit Union chipped in $1,000 for a grand total of $4,094.

Diane Clark, Office of Environmental Services, collected $1,998.80 in jars that she placed throughout the department. HFCU added $500 to that for a grand total of $2,498.80, which was donated to the Sharing Corner food shelf in St. Paul’s Frogtown community.