County adopts salary plan
By Steve Herring
Published in News on January 6, 2016 1:46 PM
A new job classification plan that will mean salary increases for employees in the Sheriff's Office received unanimous approval Tuesday from Wayne County commissioners.
And commissioners promised that other departments will be reviewed to ensure that the county pays competitive salaries to keep the county from being a training ground for other counties.
The plan will go into effect March 1 and will cost the county another $400,000 for the remainder of the current budget year.
"It is about money, but then again it is not all about money -- the biggest thing is retention," Commissioner Wayne Aycock said. "I mean we are training them, not only the sheriff's department, but other departments, too. We are training them then they go somewhere else."
The officers put their lives on the line for the public every day, he said.
It is the same issue in the Department of Social Services, Commissioner Bill Pate said.
"If you recall when we talked about the budget we said we couldn't possibly do it salary adjustments) all in one year," County Manager George Wood said. "So it is going to be a multi-year thing."
Pate said he had just wanted to make sure that other county employees did not think they were being excluded from possible salary adjustments.
"The approach is when we do one we are trying to get it where it needs to be -- not just piecemeal it," Wood said. "So this one, we feel like will be in good shape going forward.
"We want to do the same with the paramedics. We want to solve the problem there and then, as you said Bill, come back the next budget year and try to put money in that same account and try to do some others. We do have some issues with DSS caseworkers. There is no doubt about that."
There is a lot of turnover in that department, Wood said.
Wood credited Sheriff Larry Pierce for all of his hard work with county staff on coming up with the reclassification plan.
"We have come up with a good career ladder plan for our employees," Wood said. "It makes sense. I think it is defensible if we were challenged on it."
Chairman Joe Daughtery said that when people see the $400,000 cost that he hopes they realize it has been a number of years since the last salary analysis was conducted.
"This board committed last year that we would start this process," he said. "This took place over a number of months of study and review. It is something that we have got to do if we are going to be competitive to bringing in our trained law enforcement.
"We are really running into a problem in regards to getting detention officers to staff the new facility (jail) that we are about to open. Hopefully this will help the sheriff in recruiting."
Commissioner Ed Cromartie asked how many employees are in the Sheriff's Office.
Wood said there are approximately 185 including sworn officers, detention officers and others. That is why the cost is so high, because of the number of employees in the department, Wood said.
"This is one of our biggest departments," he said. "Probably the only one that comes close to that would be DSS. That is going to be a big one, too, just from the number of employees."
Commissioner Ray Mayo said that a national survey of employees found that salary, while important, is not employees' No. 1 concern.
The top concern is having a good place to work, he said.