EL PASO COUNTY — All five of the El Paso County DMV offices closed early last Friday for a staff holiday party. The El Paso County Clerk and Recorder said the decision was a way to improve employee morale and reduce turnover.
"To me, this is a celebration of what they have done this past year, we are the largest, most populous county in the entire state," El Paso County Clerk and Recorder Steve Schleiker said.
The Clerk and Recorder oversees the recording department, the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV), and Elections. Schleiker noted elections staff have had a busy month, working through the Thanksgiving weekend to conduct a mandatory recount, for House District 16 after November's election. He said DMV workers often take care of 3,000 customers a day, many services are also available online.
Schleiker, who was elected as the clerk and recorder in 2022, said he learned when he first took office the team had not met as an entire entity. He pointed out El Paso County has the only DMV office location in the entire state open on Saturdays.
The hope with the holiday party is to help with employee morale and reduce the turnover in the office, Schleiker said.
"If you have a very high turnover, that is a significant amount of taxpayer money. When you're sitting here looking at rehiring, retraining and bringing people up to speed and things like that," Schleiker said.
The Clerk and Recorder also said he looked at the data to determine last Friday was typically a low-traffic day for the DMV offices.
"I felt we did not take anything away because again, we offered the opportunity, which nobody else in the state does, because we were open from 8am to 1pm on Saturday," Schleiker said, "Many of these folks are working six days a week and they don't gripe. They are happy."
Schleiker believes in the long run, retaining employees at the office benefits taxpayers.
"I learned a long time ago in management 101, and something I learned when I was a United States Marine is if you take care of the people who take care of you, things will work themselves out," Schleiker said.
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