Pay saga takes a strange turn

An effort to boost pay for the Hamilton County Commission’s chairman and vice chairman didn’t work out quite as planned Wednesday.

It was the same day commissioners re-elected Chester Bankston and Randy Fairbanks to another year-long term as chairman and vice chairman.

A resolution up for a vote would honor their leaders’ hard work by bumping their pay by 40 percent and 30 percent, respectively, over the nine-member commission’s 2017 base of $22,786.

Instead, they ended up slashing the proposed raises by about $4,000 and reducing the leadership’s compensation rate going forward. And they handed out more than $10,000 in back pay to ex-leaders no longer on the commission.

Talking about the measure at last week’s agenda session, commissioners described it as an attempt to reconcile two pay rates: one set by resolution in 1990 and the current practice, adopted in 1999 in a memo.

The 1990 resolution called for the 40/30 percent leadership premiums. At that time, Commissioner Joe Graham pointed out last week, commission pay was $6,000 a year.

Commissioners went eight years without a raise before they voted to reform their pay structure in fiscal 2000. The new plan linked commission salaries to the county mayor’s. It set the base salary at $16,230 and gave the chair and vice chair an extra $5,000 and $2,500 respectively. Commission raises would be the same percentage the county mayor received.

Wednesday’s resolution was billed as a way to “clarify the compensation” of leadership, keeping the link between commissioners’ base pay and the county mayor’s salary, but setting the leadership premium at the 40/30 percent level and calling for back pay for former commission leadership.

At last week’s agenda session, County Attorney Rheubin Taylor called it a “housekeeping” measure. Several commissioners said they supported codifying the pay policy.

“It fixes a problem,” Bankston said.

But when the resolution came up for a vote Wednesday, Commissioner Jim Fields introduced an amendment to keep the leadership premiums at $5,000 and $2,500. Graham said he, too, had an amendment, but liked Fields’ and didn’t introduce his own.

Commissioner Warren Mackey asked for more time to study the amendments, but County Attorney Rheubin Taylor said the county finance department needed them to act quickly.

No one spoke against a premium for the commission leaders. Several commissioners said their jobs have become much more complicated over the years, and their compensation should reflect the amount of time they spend serving constituents and the county.

“Hamilton County does not look anything like it did in 1990. The responsibilities of these commissioners have grown exponentially since then,” Commissioner Tim Boyd said.

Then-Chairman Curtis Adams said the same in the 1998 pay reform, newspaper archives show.

“Government is increasingly more complex with more time and effort required to do the job properly,” Adams said.

Fields’ amendment was adopted 6-2, with Boyd, Fairbanks, Fields, Graham, Sabrena Smedley and Bankston voting yes. Greg Beck and Warren Mackey voted no. The vote to adopt the amended resolution was 8-0.

Fairbanks said commissioners were not changing the leadership premium but “setting a new direction” in the importance of the chairman’s and vice chairman’s roles.

Nobody pointed out that Fields’ amendment did make a significant change in that premium. In past years, county officials said, the boost was eligible for the same percentage increase as the base salary. The amendment as adopted says the flat-rate premium is no longer eligible for those percentage raises.

So, at the end of the day, it looks like this:

A 40 percent boost, as proposed in the original resolution, would have put the chairman’s pay at $31,900. The flat rate as approved sets it at $27,786.

The vice chair’s pay would have been $29,622; under the flat rate it’s $25,286.

And the leadership premiums no longer qualify for whatever percentage of raises the commission approves for county employees.

There was a bright spot for commission leaders present and past, though.

Fields’ amendment rescinded the 1990 pay scale but ordered current and past leaders to receive back pay for the 40/30 pay increases they should have received under that 1990 resolution. Taylor said the retroactive pay will go back only six years because of the statute of limitations.

County government officials said Wednesday afternoon that something more than $33,000 will come out of the commission’s budget for the payments, which will include Social Security at 7.65 percent.

According to county records, six people — chairmen and vice chairmen — are eligible for back pay: Fred Skillern, $8,879 Jim Coppinger, $1,073 Larry Henry, $5,250 Jim Fields, $6,969 Chester Bankston, $5,318

Randy Fairbanks, $3,280

(Does not include required Social Security match of 7.65 percent. Total including Social Security is around $33,000.)

Contact staff writer Judy Walton at jwalton@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6416.