An issue has arisen in our county due to the county judge appointing certain commissioners to oversee county departments. For instance, one commissioner is in charge of physical facilities, one in charge of the personnel dept., and one in charge of Indidgent health care. These are all departments that do not have an elected official head, and are not statutorily mandated to answer to anyone in particular (i.e.: juvenile probation answers to Juvenile Judge(s).
Any help on where to look??

The milieu in our county is roughly similar. Here, there is no de jure designation of a particular commissioner as the head of a particular department. It is more of a de facto supervisory arrangement. It must remain that way in order to maintain consistency with article 5, section 18, which makes the commissioners court as a whole the entity responsible for overseeing county business. As such, ultimate action concerning a department under the direct supervision of the commissioners court requires the action of the court as a whole, since one commissioner cannot effectuate the work of the court as a body (unless he/she is appointed a contracting agent under section 262.001 of the Local Government Code. That provision is of little application here, since the county is incapable of contracting with itself to perform services it's already obligated to perform. If it does so, it will go blind.).

This issue has been under discussion for some time by our elected officials (Williamson County). The County Judge serves as the person who is most in charge of these nonelected departments (technology, maintenance, human services) but each has a paid department head.

So, if a single elected official is unhappy with the service or thinks the service somehow infringes on his constitutional duties, what can happen?

I think there ultimately has to be a very sensitive county judge who can accomodate all the elected officials. That's a tall order.

But it has been interesting to learng how technology, for example, can control large amounts of criminal justice information and have no direct responsibility to the elected official that generates the information (the DA). Or, as another example, all the security in the world won't keep maintenance from going through your office, where you may keep very confidential materials.

How does your office deal with these issues?

Nor can that security keep the custodial staff out. The same, or even greater, concerns are presented, since employment law concerns mean that those folks sometimes aren't just employees; they're also consumers of the county's criminal justice services, if you know what I mean.

In Potter County, the paid department heads officially report to the commissioners court as a whole. This system makes it incumbent upon elected officials to take on a more cooperative tone in their interactions with the court if they want the commissioners to rein in the county's non-elective departments. That doesn't always happen.

One possibility I have mulled over is to require training for the IT and facilities maitenance people who have access to sensitive areas and offices regarding the consequences of violating penal provisions such as misuse of official information, as well as the Public Information Act's confidentiality section. It may also be a good idea to persuade the commissioners court to adopt a strict policy on confidentiality (at least in the law enforcement and human resources contexts), including spelling out that violation will result in discipline up to and including termination.

That being said, the entire concept is one which harkens to the folk wisdom that all a lock does is keep an honest fellow honest.