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For more information, contact:
Nanette Schimpf, Senior Director
Florida Sterling Council
(850) 224-0174 or (850) 528-2639

 
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (June 8, 2007) - Governor Charlie Crist, Lt. Governor Jeff Kottkamp, and the Florida Sterling Council announced today seven organizations received the 2007 Sterling Quality Achievement Award for their performance excellence.  Coral Springs Charter School, Hillsborough County Tax Collector's Office, Marion County Sheriff's Office, Miami-Dade County Transit Department, Orange County Clerk of Courts, Studer Group, and the United States Coast Guard Air Station, Clearwater Clinic were honored at the Governor's Sterling Award Banquet at the JW Marriott Orlando Grande Lakes on June 1.
 
"By following the Sterling Criteria and dedicating themselves to excellence, these seven organizations exemplify the brilliance of our great state," said Governor Charlie Crist.
 
The Sterling Quality Achievement recognition is given to organizations for approaches, methods, strategies, or processes that represent role model practices other organizations could learn from.  Each winner underwent a series of in-depth assessments and evaluations by Sterling examiners that analyzed productivity and organizational performance.
 
Coral Springs Charter School
Coral Springs Charter School, under the management of Charter Schools USA, opened in the fall of 1999 as the largest municipally sponsored charter school in the United States. Governed by the City of Coral Springs and under the contract with the School Board of Broward County, the school combines both middle and high school students in grades six though twelve with a total enrollment of 1600 students. Coral Springs Charter School is being recognized for their Academic and Career Excellence Academy (ACE Academy).  ACE Academy provides students in the 12th grade with the opportunity for an executive internship with a participating corporate sponsor.  Each year 30 students are selected and placed with a high-level executive in the student's chosen career field. ACE students also complete a Capstone Project, allowing them to apply, synthesize and showcase the knowledge and skills gained through their internship experience.   Since the inception of the ACE Academy in the 2003-2004 school year, 120 students have successful completed the program.
 
Hillsborough County Tax Collector's Office
The Hillsborough County Tax Collector (HCTC), located in Tampa, Florida, collects and distributes over $1.5 billion annually and handles over 1 million motor vehicle, vessel and mobile home transactions. HCTC currently employee over 300 people and has an annual budget of $23.2 million. The Hillsborough County Tax Collector's Office is being recognized for their Disaster Mitigation Plan, which provides for uniform polices and procedures for the effective coordination of actions necessary to prepare for, respond to, recover from and mitigate natural or man-made disasters. The plan resulted in the "hardening" of several Tax Collector facilities, including the installation of industrial-sized generators to ensure continuity of operations in the event of a storm or other disaster.  HCTC is often asked by other agencies to demonstrate its disaster mitigation program and share it as a best practice at various conferences.
 
Marion County Sheriff's Office
The Marion County Sheriff's Office (MCSO) was established in 1844 through the election of its first Sheriff and has been continual to the present. MCSO is a full service law enforcement agency equipped with a variety of resources to meet the unique needs of its citizens. Marion County Sheriff's Office is being recognized for their Crisis Intervention Unit.  This model unit is believed to be the first of its kind for law enforcement in the state where trained mental health specialists are actually employees of the Sheriff's Office.  The unit was created in the fall of 2005 in response to a community needs analysis of mental health issues, domestic violence, suicide, elderly issues, and other cases as an approach intended to reduce the probability of the escalation of violence.   In April 2007, the unit provided assistance to officers in 464 cases and did 84 follow-ups to cases, which allowed officers to return to active response status quickly.   Through the unit's intervention and education, the domestic violence homicide rate for Marion County dropped from four in 2005 to one in 2006.
 
Miami-Dade County Transit Department
The Miami-Dade County Transit (MDT) is the 12th largest public transit system in the nation and the largest in Florida, serving Miami-Dade County. Transportation services are delivered via four modes:   Metrobus, Metrorail, Metromover, and Paratransit Transportation. Miami-Dade County Transit Department is being recognized for their Preventive Maintenance Program. MDT has established an aggressive preventive maintenance program for its fleet of trains and buses.  Systematic analysis of operating data and duty cycle, along with inspection and testing of critical components at defined intervals has been used as a tool to predict potential failures. This program has reduced the catastrophic failures and improved the reliability of the transit system. The proactive reliability and condition based maintenance program has netted an annual savings of $1.32 million to MDT this year.
 
Orange County Clerk of the Courts
The Orange County Clerk of the Courts is a government entity, one of 67 Clerk offices in the State of Florida. The clerk is an elected constitutional officer for the Ninth Judicial Circuit. The Office of the Clerk is the Hub of the Justice System, supporting the Judiciary in the courtroom and maintaining millions of records, in addition to performing its collections responsibilities. It has been calculated that the Clerk's office performs more than 900 constitutional and statutory functions or duties. Orange County Clerk of the Courts is being recognized for their Collection and Disbursement of Fines, Fees, and Costs.  The office's cash receipts for 2006 were $232 million, up 4.5 percent from the previous year and up from $148 million in 2002. Restitution collections rose to $1.7 million in 2006, up an impressive 54.5 percent. More than $556,500 was raised in Defendant Economic Responsibility Project dollars, which is money collected from defendants who use a public defender or conflict attorney. That number has increased steadily for six years, including 4.5 percent in 2006.
 
Studer Group, Gulf Breeze
Studer Group is a small privately owned health care consulting firm founded in 1999.  Studer Group has a compelling mission to make healthcare a better place for employees to work, physicians to practice, and patients to receive care.  To achieve these outcomes, Studer Group helps implement prescriptive tools and processes that organizations use to create and sustain quantifiable outcomes that define service and operational excellence. Studer Group is being recognized for their Cross-Cutting Rewards and Recognition Program. It begins with the leadership system, and the "managing up" process followed by the senior leaders. Each month, supervisors are asked to provide examples of specific behaviors exhibited by employees who went above and beyond. These are sent to the President and CEO of the company and personal recognition is sent to employee's homes in the form of a thank you note.  Notes are sometimes sent to spouses to recognize employee commitment – and thank the spouse for their support of the employee's work.
 
U.S. Coast Guard Air Station, Clearwater Healthcare System
 The Air Station Clearwater Clinic is a division of the United States Coast Guard Air Station Clearwater. The main clinic in Clearwater and its satellite, sector St. Petersburg clinic, form the U.S. Coast Guard Air Station Clearwater Healthcare System or Clearwater Healthcare System (CHS). CHS is tasked with maintaining the medical and dental readiness of active duty and reserve members. CHS became the Coast Guard's largest Air Station in 1987 and today CHS maintains the healthcare readiness posture needed to support the 4000 sorties conducted each year along the coasts of Florida, the Bahamas, and the Caribbean.  The U.S. Coast Guard Air Station, Clearwater Healthcare System is being recognized for their Patient Paging System. A relatively inexpensive pager system, which was purchased to provide patients with a pager, similar to the ones issued by restaurants, so that when their turn came up, the pager would go off. The wireless messaging solution has minimized the waiting room chaos and has improved the Coast Guard's efficiency. It is estimated that since this program has been implemented over $86,400 has been saved a year.  
 
Established in 1992, the Florida Sterling Council is a public/private not-for-profit organization supported by the Executive Office of the Governor.  Sterling's Annual Conference is exclusively designed to teach participants how to achieve performance excellence and increase productivity.  More than 1,400 executives and professionals gather at this event for a one-stop source for education, information, and inspiration. The Conference concludes with the recognition of best practices, the Team Showcase Champion, and presentation of the Governor's Sterling Awards. For more information on the Florida Sterling Council, contact Dione Geiger at (850) 922-5316. For other information visit the website at www.floridasterling.com.