A 2012-2013 wellness initiative for employees and a social media policy were approved last week by the Mehlville Fire Protection District Board of Directors.

Board members voted unanimously July 18 to approve the wellness initiative and social media policy. Chief Brian Hendricks presented both proposals to the board earlier this month.

District officials for several months “have been reviewing different ways that we can look long term and look down the road at expenditures that are tough to budget for,” Hendricks told the board July 5.

“And I think we all know that one of the biggest line items in our budget every year is health insurance,” the chief said. “In order to try to keep our health insurance premiums down as much as possible, we have looked into several different ways of doing that and one thing that we have decided is that we feel a wellness program for the district is something that we need to embrace.”

The district currently spends $16,000 per year to have Interactive Health Solutions Inc. perform a standard blood draw on all employees. The results are provided to employees and are tied to a district contribution to an employee’s Health Savings Account, or HSA.

“But one thing that we realized is there’s no involvement with a physician. There’s no involvement with a doctor,” Hendricks said, adding district officials learned the number of employees who do not have a doctor or see a doctor on a regular basis “is quite staggering.”

As a result, the chief proposed the district eliminate triennial physical examinations for employees, which cost more than $100,000 per year, and the blood draw done by Interactive Health Solutions.

Instead, the wellness program would include an annual physical examination and blood draw for employees.

“It will be no cost to the employee because it is already something in our (health insurance) premium,” Hendricks said. “So when that employee goes to the doctor, he sees his doctor. He gets his blood drawn. The results are then sent back to the doctor, and then the doctor and our employee can have a conversation about their blood pressure. Are they pre-diabetic? …

“What we’re trying to do is encourage our employees to have a relationship with their doctor, and we’re going to tie that to the HSA contribution …,” he said.

Incentives included in the wellness initiative are:

• A $300 contribution in 2013 to an employee’s HSA account if they have the physical and blood draw done, along with participating in a healthy nutrition webinar.

• A $100 HSA contribution in 2013 for employees who sign an affidavit stating they will not smoke tobacco.

• A $100 HSA contribution in 2013 for employees participating in a pedometer challenge “where we encourage the employees to walk 10,000 steps a day to encourage good cardiovascular health,” Hendricks said.

Furthermore, he said, “We’re proposing that we allow the employees to use the fitness equipment at (Engine) House 3 and (Engine) House 5 at no cost to them — on or off duty — between the hours of 8 in the morning and 8 at night. In essence, it’s a gym membership …

“So I just think it’s a different way of looking at things,” Hendricks continued. “I believe that it will keep our long-term costs down if we are able to catch one illness. We’re focusing on our employees having a relationship with the doctor.”

Noting that the district has budgeted $64,400 for HSA contributions this year, Hendricks recommended the same amount be budgeted for 2013.

“It’s really an incentive-based program,” he said. “It doesn’t hurt our employees. I think it’s a benefit to them, and I think that it would move us in the right direction, hoping that we can catch big claim early.”

The wellness program would cost slightly more than $5,200, including a smoking cessation course for employees, pedometers, pedometer challenge gift cards and Weight Watchers reimbursements.

At the July 18 board meeting, Hendricks recommended the Board of Directors approve the proposed wellness initiative.

Social media policy adopted

In presenting the proposed social media policy to the board July 5, Hendricks noted district officials had reviewed the social media policies of other organizations.

“… Times have changed, the world has changed and social media is something that is everywhere,” he said. “You can’t go anywhere without everybody knowing it. And basically what I think this does, is this just gives — this is something we’re going to have to talk to the union about. It is an EMoPP (Employee Manual of Policies and Procedures) issue.

“So I think that the great thing about it is, is that this is something — this just sets rules, just lays the framework and the foundation for ‘this is what you can do, this is what you can’t do’ … I think a lot of it is common sense, but you have to have some sort of social media policy …”

Hendricks told the board he believed the proposed policy was fair.

At the July 18 meeting, Hendricks told board members “a couple of minor changes” were made to the proposed policy during the meet-and-confer process with district representatives of Local 2665 of the International Association of Fire Fighters.

“One big issue during the meet-and-confer process was that we didn’t have YouTube in there,” he said. “YouTube is a social media site that can be used for training purposes. So there were a couple of very good items that were brought up during the meet-and-confer process.

“The changes that you have there are minor. They do not change the spirit of the social media policy,” Hendricks said, adding the district’s legal counsel had reviewed the policy.

Board members voted unanimously to approve the policy, which states, in part, “The district reserves the right to review Facebook accounts, YouTube, Twitter, blogs, postings of any other type of social networking, by employees, presented to the district. YouTube may be used for training purposes only.”

Among the policy’s provisions are:

• “Employees shall not participate in social networking activities on district computers or district-provided communications devices or equipment.”

• “Bloggers and commenters are personally responsible for their commentary on blogs and social networking sites. Bloggers and commenters can be held personally liable for commentary that is considered defamatory, obscene, proprietary or libelous by any offended party, not just Mehlville Fire Protection District.”

• “The district may monitor all messages and information on district-provided communication devices while employees are both on and off duty. Employees need to anticipate their district-provided communication devices may be monitored for seemingly routine business purposes or no purpose at all.”

• “Employees shall allow MFPD to search any district-provided computer, communication device or equipment if the district makes the request.”