LTTE: County Government should use evaluations to award pay raises to county employees
As I listened to my barber rail against two of his fellow County Council members who had voted not to adopt the 2013 budget, I thought, “This guy just doesn’t get it!” Others in the shop at the time were thinking the same; their body language said as much.
The issue that generated the tirade had to do with “across the board” salary increases for county employees. County Commissioners and county government department heads recommend such annual increases and the County Council has routinely adopted those salary recommendations. The alternative is some sort of pay scale that includes employee evaluations and specific recommendations from supervisors.
Government cannot be operated exactly like a private business. However, government can be operated in a more business-like fashion. This could include having employee evaluations, pay incentives, bonuses for exceptional service or cost-cutting and other methods of paying employees found in the private sector.
Adopting different methods of paying county employees in place of “across the board” increases is clearly above my barber’s pay grade. “For what we get paid as County Council members, we can’t make a decision on each and every county employee’s pay.”
Perhaps its time to put aside past practices, free ourselves of officeholders who are stuck in the mud of too many years of service and elect people who are willing to apply sound business practices to the conduct of government.
Don Hayes Jasper
Perhaps his time is worth more than the county can spare?
First of all, the county council should never be the ones to "make a decision on each and every county employee's pay" – at least not individually. Moreover, because of how government entities are operated with advance and limited budgets plus essentially not-for profit rules, etc, and under various regulatory oversight stipulations such as the state board of accounts, merit increases of the kind described are difficult if not impossible. Consequently, or accordingly, they are rarely if ever found in the local government arena for those reasons. Most of all, merit increases of the kind described are simply a bad idea.
What is a good job to merit a pay increase, better than that of another employee working just as hard, is to one supervisor (or board) totally different than to another supervisor. Pretty soon, "rubs" of various kinds…legitimate and legal ones…surface for all sorts of reasons, employee morale declines, personality differences and conflicts, changes occur in supervision and with that, opinions also change, etc, etc. It's not so easy, folks.
Not to be mistaken, the county should indeed use employee evaluations at least annually. If an employee is not doing a satisfactory job, there are progressive measures to implement for improvement and/or discipline, up to and including termination. The employee's immediate supervisors and the department heads should be doing their respective jobs. This is not the council's job. A good, saavy employment attorney can help with this and I'm sure other progressive local government entities have these in place and practice.
Also, there can be certain incentives such as lower health insurance premiums (more take-home pay) for non-smokers and those who maintain their cholesterol within limits, as an example. Another example is sick leave hours…additional hours or monetary pay-out or buy-back awards for those who use less, and there are still others. But again, these are not to be confused with basic but all-too-subjective pay increases for one employee over another, because of favoritism or friendship, a perceived "good job" (by what and whose definition?), etc. This happens, and it will happen with merit increases of the kind described. It will open a can of worms. Across-the-board works best if other, proper checks-and-balances for employee performance are in place and being practiced.
By the way, do the county council members know that in giving a flat 50-cent per hour raise to hourly employees, they approved a far greater increase than the 1.5 percent approved by Jasper and Huntingburg??? The county increase amounted to about 2.5 to 5 percent per employee depending on the individual employee's hourly wage. The 1.5 percent for Jasper and Huntingburg amounted to about 15 to 35 cents per hour depending on an average range of comparable wages.
Full time hourly employees actually receive a slightly larger raise than salaried employees. I wonder if the council did the math.
52 weeks x 40 hours = 2080
$1,000 raise / 2080 hours = $.48 / hour
It only amounts to $40 per year, maybe a dinner for two, but it might matter to the salaried employees.
What about the difference between hours worked by salaried personal. Some work 35 hrs per wk and some 40 hrs per week and get the same $1000 raise. So they are getting $.55 per hour versus $.48 per hour
Personally, to Nick's point, I don't have a problem with this difference, a nominal one and probably more a result of arbitrary or ballpark rounding than anything else. It may have been the opposite last time or next time, or if it were $400 instead of $40 per year it might be a concern worth addressing as to why, etc.
To Guest, yes, not unlike for different wages the same .50 per hour calculates to different percentages, your example calculates to different hourly amounts. Still, in both cases, it's the same bottom line.
While so much of this depends on the individual agreement between the employer and employee, it's rare to have different salaried employees with a different agreement, with some only required to average 35 hours per week and others required to average 40 hours per week. It's not uncommon for a salaried worker to work 35 hours per week from time to time, as long as this is (typically) offset by an equal (or close) number of 45-hour weeks. In most situations, salaried employees don't punch a clock and are on their honor. They are salaried because of their job classification – usually one of supervision and responsibility – which frequently requires additional and unscheduled hours that can be offset by some reduced hours the next day, week or month, when able, etc. As long as the salaried employee isn't being taken advantage of by his or her employer in having to work consistent 50-60 hour weeks, overtime, etc, or conversely takes advantage of their employer by working less hours without making them up. In certain cases, salaried employees may even be eligible for overtime…no room to expand on that one.
I'm concerned more about the comment by the President of the county council than the raises! Who is he to make the comment " with what we get paid as council members!" he's the elected leader of the county council who is charged with the responsibilities of taking care of our tax dollars. He asked for and was elected to this position by the citizens of Dubois County for 28 years and now is seeking re-election. Absurd! We don't have to look at Washington for such abuse of public trust It's here folks and time for this guy to go!