Dallas County employees will get to celebrate the holidays a little longer this year.

Dallas County Probate Judge Kim Ballard announced during Monday’s Commission meeting county employees will be given both Friday, Dec. 23 and Monday, Dec. 26 as a paid holiday.

“We have a pleasant surprise for our employees thanks to the Commissioners sitting up here,” Ballard said. “This has been a tough last few years and we haven’t been able to give raises like we wanted to and we did absorb a lot of benefits for the employees. We had scheduled to just have the one day off for Christmas and the Commission decided to give the Friday before Christmas and the Monday following.”

The commission voted to amend the schedule to accommodate the change.

The commission also voted to accept a $350,000 grant agreement for Camp Perry Varner.

The grant will help the camp accommodate campers and aid in its every day operations.

Barbara Harrell also reported a new GASB reporting policy will be implemented for fiscal year 2011 financial statements where fund balances will be reclassified.

“A lot of our financial statements are going to look different because we have a 40 percent expenditure to match the expenditure in revenues,” she said. “Whatever is left over, if it is below that 40 percent, everything is going to be dumped in the general fund.”

Changes of this kind, Ballard said, are nothing new.

“They have a new one every year,” Ballard said. “Last year we had to count all of our right-of-ways and roads as assets. This one is simply going to change the looks of our financial statement, it won’t change the bottom line.”