CITY STARTS TRAINING ON DRUG TESTING

Computer Will Randomly Select Those To Be Tested

Monday December 17, 2001; 11:00 AM Charleston city employees who must begin
random drug tests beginning Jan. 1 are being trained and informed about
what to expect when the testing begins.

City Council approved spending $5,100 to pay for the training that is being
done in a number of shifts because of the varying work hours of city
workers, said Judy King, city personnel director.

Last year, the city spent $8,202 to test 168 people. The projected cost of
the new program, which will test 450 people, is $18,300.

The new program states that all city workers who are in safety sensitive
positions, which include just about all city workers, King said, will be
subject to random drug testing.

Every month about 25 employees will be tested for drug use and 13 will be
tested for alcohol. The names of those to be tested are randomly chosen by
an out-of-state computer, King said.

By testing 25 for drugs and 13 for alcohol each month during the course of
the year, about half of city employees will be tested for drugs and a
quarter will be tested for alcohol.

When an employee tests positive for drugs or alcohol, a medical review
officer, who is a physician, will talk to the employee and determine if
that employee is on some medication that might have given a false positive
to the test.

If the medical review officer finds no reason the test should have turned
up positive, then the results are turned over to human resources, King said.

City employees will be allowed, if it is the first time they've tested
positive, to seek substance abuse counseling during their own time, at
their own expense. They will then be retested for the presence of drugs or
alcohol before they are allowed to return to work, King said.

"If they choose not to do what we've asked them, then they are fired," she
said.

In addition to the monthly drug tests, the city will also do
pre-employment, return to duty and reasonable suspicion drug testing, King
said.

Last week, a second city employee, Robert Eugene Smith, was arrested on a
charge of possession with the intent to deliver a controlled substance.

Smith, a worker with the Street Department, may be fired from his job,
authorities said.

Detectives first arrested Brian Doughty, another worker in the Street
Department, and charged him with possession with intent to deliver.

Mayor Jay Goldman said the city won't tolerate such actions from employees.