Pocahontas County Board of Health dismisses administrator

The Pocahontas County Board of Health terminated its administrator on Tuesday due to a number of conflicts with employees since the beginning of the year.

The board voted 3-0 to terminate Anne Thompson after a closed session on Tuesday afternoon in which the board reviewed a month-long investigation by the county’s human resources department.  

The investigation found Thompson:

• Was inconsistent with an employee’s use of leave time.
• Abused her discretion during disciplinary actions with employees.
• Stifled employee input on internal policies.
• Mishandled an employee’s private information about staff by communicating it to other employees. 

It also found financial irregularities on the public health department’s audits in 2020 and 2021. 

“Roughly the consensus was that there were employees with concerns about Thompson’s management style,” said County Attorney Dan Feistner about the outcome of the county’s investigation. 

Thompson didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Feistner noted the termination had nothing to do with an audit the Iowa Auditor of State released earlier this month that found Thompson improperly deposited $19,600 in revenues when she was fiscal manager of Buena Vista County Public Health. 

Pocahontas County interviewed Thompson about the audit of Buena Vista County; Thompson proclaimed her innocence despite the audit’s findings, according to Feistner. Feistner declined to comment on Thompson’s specific claims because doing so might “impede and/or interfere” with a separate investigation. 

“We were satisfied with her answers, really we couldn’t look into them all that closely because the conduct in question didn’t happen when she was employed by Pocahontas County,” Feistner said.  

A seven-page report of the investigation showed an inquiry began Jan. 26 after the county’s human resources department received a text from a public health employee that asked whether the administrator could make an employee go to the doctor. 

The county’s human resources coordinator then spoke to employees about concerning management patterns he heard about. An employee told the coordinator that Thompson “had stated to multiple staff that an employee who called in sick was pushing her luck and she, as a boss, could sleep just fine at night after firing staff.”

The investigation also outlines an escalating dispute between Thompson and a clinical manager who worked a half-hour of overtime without prior authorization. 

Thompson asked if she could deny the overtime payment and whether she could discipline the employee, the investigation shows. The HR department said she couldn’t withhold the overtime, but she could render discipline. 

Feistner said that dispute escalated to the employee’s resignation, which was supposed to take effect April 1. Feistner claimed Thompson terminated the employee before the April 1 date, an action that was barred by the open meetings law. 

The board reinstated the employee. Then the board fired Thompson. 

Feistner noted two board members, Pocahontas Area Supt. Joe Kramer and Dr. Shane Kirkegaard, have resigned because they didn’t agree with the employee being reinstated. Kramer said he resigned due to time commitments from his current job. 

Correction: Kirkegaard said he didn't resign due to the dispute between Thompson and the clinical manager. "Due to the current dynamics and circumstances, I thought I'd be able to use my time more effectively in other ways," Kirkegaard told the board of health.