Ask a state worker who used to work in Waterbury where they’re working now and you are apt to get the answer: Depends on the day.
Bit by bit, desk by desk, that’s changing.
Two-and-a-half months after Tropical Storm Irene whipped through the state office complex in Waterbury and disrupted the routine of about 1,500 state employees, some of them are still settling in to new, temporary quarters. If you’re looking to call certain state offices, you might have to work at finding the right number.
Some 90 Agency of Natural Resources workers are moving this week into offices at Northern Power System in Fayston, said Tom Sandretto, deputy commissioner of the Department of Buildings and General Services. Another 15 ANR employees are slated to join colleagues at the Vermont Student Assistance Corp. building in Winooski.
Another 75 Department of Corrections employees will soon move into offices on Industrial Avenue in Williston, Sandretto said. A dozen Department for Children & Families lawyers are waiting for new quarters.
Why has it taken 2½ months for these employees to land in temporary quarters?
“It’s been a major endeavor,” Sandretto said.
Movers who were hauling file cabinets and other office equipment out of the upper floors of the Waterbury complex to new offices had no elevators to use, Sandretto said, as those were disabled by the flooding.
Ruthann Sullivan, the state’s telecommunications director, has been embroiled in connecting Waterbury state workers to new telephone and computer service since the day the storm hit Aug. 28.
“I can see the light at the end of the tunnel,” she said Monday after returning from the future Corrections offices in Williston. She spent last week in Fayston working on installation of phones and Internet in a spot that has not cell phone coverage.
In Williston, she said, they ran out of available phone numbers. Coordinating moves has been akin to putting on a ballet, Sullivan said. It’s better to install computer and phone hookups before all the furniture and employees are moved in, but employees need a place to work and when it’s done the phone needs to sit on a desk.
Vermonters trying to reach the disrupted state offices have sometimes needed to do a bit of sleuthing. Some individual agency websites list the updated numbers, but the online Vermont state directory does not. The Agency of Human Services website provides a list of contact information for its departments.
In some cases, the Waterbury phone extensions have been forwarded to new numbers. In other cases, employees have left messages on old voicemails indicating new numbers to call. Some employees have two phone lines going. In still others, a phone company recording indicates the numbers have changed.
“It’s kind of a mixed bag,” Sullivan said.
That is gradually becoming more consistent, she said. As agencies settle into new offices, they will have the 241 Waterbury exchanges disconnected and callers dialing the agencies’ published 241 numbers will hear a phone company recording giving the new number.
“The pieces are coming together,” Agency of Human Services Secretary Doug Racine said Monday, calling from a new 871 phone exchange at his relatively new office on Hurricane Lane in Williston.
For employees, Racine said, the moves have not all been easy. Some have added 40 minutes each way to their daily commutes and not everyone has found the bus service the state initiated practical. Racine said some employees have quit because they couldn’t make the new schedule work for their families. How much has all this moving cost? Sandretto said he’ll have a tally when the moves are complete, but he’s hoping that the state office building insurance and federal emergency aid will cover it.