MILLFIELD, Ohio — As Athens County Jobs and Family Services prepares to eliminate five positions amid a fiscal crisis, one employee is sounding the alarm over impacts the cuts might have.
The Athens County Commissioners initially approved the elimination of seven positions in December 2025. That figure has since been reduced to five, Athens County JFS Director Jean Demosky said in an email. The positions set to be eliminated, all union, are:
- One social service coordinator,
- One Athens County Child Support Enforcement Agency secretary.
- Two child support enforcement agency case managers.
- One purchasing agent.
Layoff notices were sent Jan. 7 and are effective Feb. 6.
The layoffs are part of an effort by JFS to address cashflow challenges and a debt it owes to the state.
All the individuals who received layoff notices are “eligible to bump or take an open position” within the agency, Demosky said. Open positions include five transportation driver positions and two eligibility referral specialist positions.
Bumping is a process whereby union employees with higher seniority can “bump” employees with lesser seniority out of their positions. Bumping doesn’t occur when an employee applies to an open position.
At the Athens County Commissioners’ Jan. 13 meeting, Athens County Child Support Enforcement Agency Administrator and Lead Attorney Keith M. Wiens questioned the decision to cut positions in child support enforcement. Wiens explained his concerns in a lengthy email to Commissioner Chris Chmiel, which the Independent obtained via public records request.
“I have heard that upper management thinks [Athens County Child Support Enforcement Agency] is over staffed. I disagree,” Wiens wrote to Chmiel. The child support enforcement agency has a staff of 15, he noted.
Wiens said in his email that due to the layoffs, the child support enforcement agency office will have to “reassign nearly 4,000 child support cases among fewer staff.” He voiced concern that a reduction in staff could lead to a reduction in cases, which could lead to reduced Title IV-D funding for the agency.
Title IV-D is a federal-state program, part of the Social Security Act of 1975, wherein the federal government reimburses child support enforcement agencies for the cost of seeking and obtaining child support payments from non-custodial parents.
Both Wiens and Demosky attended the Jan. 13 meeting, where the commissioners were unaffected by Wiens’ concerns.
“I’m not hearing anything that says, ‘If you do this, this is going to happen,’” Commissioner Charlie Adkins said.
Commissioner Lenny Eliason said to proceed with the layoffs.
“We’re not going to revisit the decision right now. Let’s finish the implementation of it,” Eliason said. “Let’s see what the difference is. If there’s a dramatic drop from three years ago or four years ago to how many cases got funneled this past year, then your [Weins’] argument might have some merit — but up till then, it doesn’t have any.”
Chmiel requested from Demosky projections to reflect how much money the agency will save due to cutting the five positions. He told the Independent Thursday he had not yet received a report.
At the meeting, Demosky asserted that the cuts to the child support enforcement agency “makes them live within their means,” in regards to its finances.
Wiens said in his email that the child support enforcement agency staff is already strained. He added that he is performing the duties of both an administrator and staff attorney, as the staff attorney has been unfilled since October 2024.
In lieu of a full-time staff attorney, Wiens said he reached out to the Athens County Prosecutor’s office for help. The child support enforcement agency and the prosecutor’s office then developed a contract, wherein the prosecutor’s office has litigated child support enforcement cases in conjunction with the child support enforcement agency. A records request for that contract is pending.
The contract employed two assistant prosecuting attorneys to child support enforcement agency cases, Wiens wrote. Contracted work began in July 2025 but was interrupted in late September 2025. It has since resumed.
Wiens said Athens County’s child support enforcement agency is an award-winning agency, recognized by the state for its “outstanding” pursuit of cases.
“In 2024 we received an award for Most Improved Collection on Arrears in a medium to small case load and an award for Most Improved Support Order Establishment,” Wiens wrote. “In 2025 we received awards for Most Improved Collections on Current Support and Best Performance in Paternity Establishment for medium caseload counties.”
Wiens could not be reached for comment in time for publication.
Other updates
Athens County JFS apparently owes about a million dollars in back pay to the state, the commissioners previously told the Independent.
Chmiel told the Independent he is meeting with the state soon, “so I can get, like, an in depth perspective. Because, like, I just don’t get enough information from Jean in writing.”
Chmiel said he is still trying to determine for himself how much the agency owes the state.
As officials work to better understand the agency’s financial position, the agency is looking into other measures to address its debt and cashflow challenges.
For one, JFS currently has a building sitting empty in Athens. Demosky said in an email Jan. 20 that nobody attended the public auction held Jan. 5 for JFS’s 510 W. Union St. building.
“The auction company heard from a potential buyer later, and those details are still pending,” she added.
Chmiel told the Independent, “I’ve been working on this, trying to find buyers for the building, and we have some interested parties.”
Additionally, the county is holding off on advertising bids for JFS’s Nelsonville building, where the agency operates the Athens County Community Cares Resource Center. Last month, the commissioners considered selling that location, too. Chmiel told the Independent he would prefer the county keep the Nelsonville location. “I’m looking at that, and there’s some partnerships that are developing around that,” he said.
JFS also previously reduced the work week for its employees, representing a 10% pay cut across the board. Demosky said that non-union staff will return to their regular 40-hour work week “because they voted to end the cost-saving agreement.” However, “Non-union staff are still taking the modified 36-hour schedule and for the moment anyway, avoiding layoffs in that employment category,” she stated.
The 36-hour work week reduction for union staff ends Jan. 31. It began Nov. 2, 2025.
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