The Baker County Health Department began implementing its workforce reduction plan last week, eliminating 15 positions and cutting the hours of three more.

The plan also reclassified four supervisory positions to career service  positions due to the loss in staff. Those employees will experience a reduction in benefits.

Affected employees were notified January 20 of the changes, which are expected to save the department $615,786 annually. That’s about 13.4 percent of the department’s $4.6 million budget.

The health department’s staff has been saddened by the layoffs, said Kerry Dunlavey, the agency’s top administrator.

“I am very sad that we could not have saved these jobs,” she said. “The continuous general revenue cuts were very difficult for us. We need to be very sensitive to the employees being laid off and we’re doing everything we can to find them jobs.”

Representatives from WorkSource and other counselors have been at the health department on West Lowder Street this week to offer assistance with job searches and applying for unemployment benefits. A job fair is planned for next week.

Conner McClean

A Glen St. Mary man was sent off to prison for three years after pleading no contest in circuit court on January 17 to his role in multiple vehicle burglaries in north Macclenny last spring.

Connor McClean, 29, was charged in May with six counts of burglary and theft — both felony and misdemeanor — and a single count of dealing in stolen property. Judge Phyllis Rosier ordered him to a three-year probation term following release, with drug offender sanctions attached.

His co-defendant Andrew Cardenas, 30, was sentenced in November to three years after entering a similar plea. Most of the overnight burglaries in late March took place in subdivisions off North Boulevard and others on Milton St. in the east city.

In another plea that drew a state prison sentence, Judge Rosier ordered Lewis S. Churchville, 52, of Macclenny to serve 18 months for possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.

The state dropped a companion charge of using a firearm while impaired.

Mr. Churchville, who has a lengthy arrest record, pleaded no contest and will be on a drug offender probation for 18 months following release. He was also ordered to pay a $2000 fine.

He was arrested in June, 2011 for shooting a gun into the air near his Tall Pine Rd. residence. The arresting officer said Mr. Churchville was drunk at the time.

His record includes convictions for felony driving on a suspended license, drunk driving and both misdemeanor and felony drug charges.