The Human Resources and Information Technology Committee met 12/08/2021. They took up three salary related items.
Item 21-1652 was a request to approve the 2022 Non Represented salary schedule with a 1.25% increase.
Director of Human Resources Jay Ratchman told the committee that this salary schedule covered all of the 640 positions within the City of Appleton. The increase was intended to help the city be competitive with the market. The rates they were proposing in the schedule were the rates they would use when recruiting candidates, and he want to make it clear that this would not result in raises for existing employees.
There were no questions and the item was approved 5-0.
Item 21-1653 was a request to approve the 2022 Seasonal salary schedule with a 1.25% increase.
Essentially, this item was the same as the previous item and it was intended to accomplish the same purpose, but it was directed toward seasonal positions, which were covered by a separate pay plan, instead of regular positions which were covered by the salary schedule just voted on. He said the city hired between 450 and 600 seasonal employees annual. And, again, they felt it important to raise the rates to help the city remain competitive with the market.
Alderperson Michael Smith (District 10) had concerns about the low pay of the Grade 1 positions and pointed out that, at the high school he worked at, scorekeepers got paid $15 an hour as compared to $8.37 or $8.76. He suggested moving the Grade 1 positions up to Grade 2 and wondered why there were no positions in Grade 2.
Director Ratchman explained that when the scale was set up they had included a Grade 2 level in case they ended up having positions that needed to be placed in that grade, but they currently didn’t have any positions at that level.
In further discussion with Alderperson Smith, he said that the city planned to look at compensation in general in 2022 and they intended to come back to the committee with a revamped pay plan sometime in the early part of 2022.
He also noted that the city actually had a harder time filling Grade 8 positions as compared to Grade 1, possibly due to the training those employees had to go through.
He stated that, based on what the market was telling them, he could provide no justification for moving Grade 1 positions up to Grade 2.
When asked by Alderperson Kristin Alfheim (District 11) Director Ratchman said that they had not had problems filling scorekeeper positions. Alderperson Alfheim didn’t think it made sense to raise the pay if they didn’t need to.
Alderpersons Denise Fenton (District 6) and Sheri Hartzheim (District 13) were both inclined to defer to Director Ratchman on this matter.
Alderperson Fenton asked for additional information on the comprehensive salary review Director Ratchman had mentioned. He answered that that comprehensive review would be for both the regular and seasonal positions. If they were going to recommend rate increases, they needed data to go behind that recommendation. They have kept tabs on the market as well as reaching out to other municipalities about their rates.
He stated, “I believe that our compensation plan for once again non-represented employees and seasonal needs some pretty significant changes both in the policy of how we pay employees but also that market analysis–a full blown look at that compensation plan. It’s been a while and it’s really overdue. Plus we know the market’s changing so rapidly, so we need to try to get in front of it a bit.”
The rate schedule currently being approved was not guaranteed to be set for 2022 and could still change. He anticipated coming to the committee in January or February with a request to engage a consultant of some sort to study the issue further.
Alderperson Alfheim asked if, due to retirements of more senior employees, the city had a cushion in its budget that might allow for increases to lower level positions.
Director Ratchman said the city should have a wage reserve, but that was more a question for the Finance Department.
The item was approved 4-1 with Alderperson Smith voting nay.
They then moved on to item 21-1654 which was the request to approve an exception to the Salary Administration Policy to allow for a 2.5% across the board adjustment in lieu of pay for performance for year-end 2021.
Director Ratchman explained that the current policy outlines that raises are based on an employees evaluation score. An employee who scored 90% would get a larger raise than one who scored 85% or one who scored 70%. That system works better when the raises are a little higher than just 2.5% because then they can really separate an exceptional performer from one who was not exceptional. Last year they had also made an exception to give a 1.5% increase across the board, and they thought that this year it would make sense to do that again. He noted that the raise would still be a performance based increase in that an employee who was not meeting expectations would not be eligible for that increase until they had shown improvement in their performance to 90 days. At that point they would be eligible for the increase but it would only be going forward from the end of the 90 days and not retroactive to the start of the year.
Alderpersons Hartzhei, Alfheim, and Fenton were in favor of the increase and thought 2.5% was a good number although Alderperson Fenton wish thry would have been able to give larger raises.
Alderperson Smith disliked the idea of not specifically rewarding exceptional employees and thought a blanket raise would disincentive hard work. He was also concerned that underperforming employees might get their performance up enough to get their raise and then slip back into underperforming again with no consequences; however, over the course of the discussion, Director Ratchman let the committee know that, out of 640 employees, only a handful might not meet expectations. Those deficits might not be due to work ethic or a willful intent to harm but rather just the result of not performing one aspect of their job well even though they were performing well in all other areas. If an employee was willfully not performing their job adequately, measures beyond implementing a performance improvement plan would probably be taken.
During the committee discussion the position seemed to end up being that this raise was only merit based in the sense that those employees who were not meeting expectations would not be eligible to receive it until their performance improved. For all other employees, it was a blanket raise that served mainly as a cost of living increase to combat inflation. They would have loved for it to be larger, but this was what they budgeted for. Director Ratchman noted that in setting the increase, they looked among other things at the 10 year history at the city and at the Consumer Price Index. When they set the number, the Consumer Price Index had been at 2.6% and they had budgeted for 2.5%. That was the logic behind that number.
Director Ratchman also reminded them that that they would be looking at the compensation plan as a whole in 2022
The committee eventually voted to approve the 2.5% across the board raise by a 4-0 vote with Alderperson Smith abstaining.
View full meeting details here: https://cityofappleton.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?ID=894914&GUID=4EB968E3-EDCA-4400-B8F8-6E5EEE47A883
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