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Raise of 3% Proposed for City Dept. Managers Giving a salary raise of 3% for 11 city department managers and adjusting the number of unused vacation days that can be sold by City Clerk Renee Vonderwerth and Treasurer Eugene Elmer are two recommendations that the city's Negotiations Committee will bring to St. Ignace City Council February 4. The raises, if approved, will be effective immediately and will award a 3% raise in 2008 and another 3% raise in 2009. The committee, which includes Mayor Paul Grondin, City Manager Eric Dodson, and Councilmen Willie LaLonde and Don Gustafson, agreed to the recommendation when it met with the department heads Wednesday, January 23. If approved, Mrs. Vonderwerth and Mr. Elmer will be able to get paid for 15 days of unused vacation time a year, instead of the 12 days they can get paid for now. Other non-union employees already get to sell up to 15 days a year. The committee did not support a request by some of the department heads to allow them free membership to the fitness center at the city's economically distressed Little Bear East Arena and Community Center. A proposal to give Recreation Facilities Manager and Programs Coordinator Erica Mattson a larger raise than the rest of the group to bring her salary closer to the rate of a recreation director was discussed, but declined, because she has only one year of experience on the job. Mr. Dodson said Council will discuss the recommendation by the city's Recreation Advisory Committee to name her recreation director at its February 4 meeting. After Phil Hinkson resigned from the position in April 2006, Mr. Dodson took on the role while he studied ways to improve the financial picture at the facility, and Mrs. Mattson was hired as facility manager and programs coordinator at a lower rate to save money. As recreation director, Mr. Dodson has been responsible for budgeting and hiring staff, for example. Mr. Hinkson's salary was $31,689 per year. Mrs. Mattson's salary will be $28,840. Whether city employees are using or selling vacation time was discussed and debated at length among the committee members. When some employees don't use their vacation, they can get paid for it by selling it back to the city. Otherwise, the unused vacation time can be accumulated and used in another year. Department heads who can get paid for their unused vacation time are the city manager, chief of police, public works director, executive secretary, and the building inspector. Some committee members questioned whether the building inspector should be allowed to bank vacation days owing to his job being only part-time. Councilman LaLonde questioned why Mr. Sved and other department heads needed to bank vacation days at all. "If everyone is selling vacation, are they taking vacation?" he asked Mr. Dodson. Mr. LaLonde voted against allowing Mr. Sved to sell vacation time during a secret city council meeting August 20, 2007, and he voted against a resolution passed in February 2006 that gave him annual leave similar to what the city's unionized employees get, arguing that a part-time employee like Mr. Sved should not have full-time benefits. He repeated his opinion at Wednesday's committee meeting. Mr. Sved is required to work a minimum of 1,300 hours and no more than 1,440 hours in a year, at a rate of $17.20 per hour, according to his annual one-year contract, and is paid on an annualized basis at the rate of 54 hours every two weeks. His part-time work amounts to 67.5% of a full-time, union employee but accrues vacation time at the same rate, 13.5 vacation days a year. Mr. Sved rarely uses his vacation time, because he works long hours during the building season and banks compensation time for the slack winter months, taking several months off. Mr. Dodson said he is allowed to bank up to 10.125 hours of his 13.5 vacation days a year. He had about 190 hours (24 days) saved up by September 11, 2007, according to city records. He can accrue up to 220 hours of vacation, according to city policy. Last August, Council agreed to pay Mr. Sved for up to 15 of those days a year, according to minutes of the August 20 meeting. Under his current pay rate, that amounts to $2,064, in addition to the $24,148.80 the city was paying, an 8.5% increase in pay. Mr. LaLonde argued that Mr. Sved only has to work 27 hours a week instead of 40 hours to receive the same vacation pay as the city's union employees work (3.47 hours of vacation every two-week pay period). Mr. Dodson said vacation hours that are sold by employees based on their current pay rate, not the rate at which the days were banked, which could have been several years ago. The city does not require that employees use their vacation time, Mr. Dodson said. Mr. Sved often works overtime during the construction season, said Mr. Dodson, keeping track of his own hours and collecting "deferred compensation" that he usually uses in February and March, when construction is slow. He is scheduled to take a six-week break starting Wednesday, January 30. Because he can only work so many hours a year, and his duties require him to work almost all of those, Mr. Sved argues that he has no time left to use his vacation hours. Mr. Dodson said the responsibilities required of the building inspector in city ordinances causes has increased Mr. Sved's workload beyond that stipulated in his contract. He suggests the city review contracts of all employees to make sure the job descriptions include tasks required by ordinances. Proposed 3% Raises for City Management Personnel City of St. Ignace
NOTE: Each position is under a two-year contract except for the building inspector, which is a one-year contract and a part-time position. Raises would become effective immediately if City Council approves the city negotiations committee's recommendation. |
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