On a split vote on Tuesday, Park County commissioners decided to give their employees the full day of Christmas Eve as a holiday.

County employees generally get the afternoon off, but commissioners have occasionally granted a full day of vacation, depending on when Christmas falls.

There will be some added costs associated with granting an extra half-day: Both the Park County Sheriff’s Office and county personnel involved with the court system still must work all of Thursday, Dec. 24, and they will now receive overtime pay.

It wasn’t clear what the cost will be for the added half-day of overtime for those employees, but Commissioner Dossie Overfield said it was a small number.

“I understand the money,” Overfield said. “I also know that it’s been a pretty tough year for them here with everything that they dealt with and the fact that we couldn’t do the raises that we wanted to do last year. I think there’s a lot of pros in allowing the half-day.”

Commissioners had hoped to give raises this fiscal year, which began in July, but settled on one-time bonuses because of concerns about lean years coming down the pike; the bonuses were equal to about 2% of employees’ pay.

Overfield added that the feedback from county staff was that they “very, very, very, very rarely” have much foot traffic on the day before Christmas.

Commissioner Jake Fulkerson also supported allowing the extra half-day off, saying he thought it would be a benefit for employees while not impacting the public.

However, Commissioner Lloyd Thiel, saying he would “be the bad guy,” spoke out against the idea.

“We have [members of the] public out here, they are out of work and they would love to have the opportunity to work,” Thiel said. “Using their tax dollars to give people time off when they’re out of work right before Christmas Eve, I’m sorry, I can’t support this.”

Commissioner Lee Livingston joined him in voting against the extra holiday time.

With the board split 2-2, Commission Chairman Joe Tilden cast the decisive vote to grant a full day off.

“This has been an absolutely extraordinary year for everybody and our people have gone through a lot and continue to go through a lot,” Tilden said.

Barring an emergency or special commission meeting between now and Jan. 5, the vote represented Fulkerson’s last action as a county commissioner. He’s being replaced by Powell City Councilman Scott Mangold, who bested Fulkerson in August’s Republican primary election.

Mangold attended Tuesday’s commission meeting and last week’s, too, as he prepares to take office. He also attended a September discussion about which polling places would be open for the general election.

At the close of the meeting, commissioners presented Fulkerson with a framed photograph of Heart Mountain and held a small reception in his honor.

“Being a county commissioner the last four years has not been much fun,” Tilden said as he handed Fulkerson the photo, thanking him for his service.

The meeting also represented Tilden’s last as chairman. As he noted with a “yay!” on Tuesday, commissioners will pick a new leader for 2021.