Sigourney Council Discusses High Employee Raises

SIGOURNEY – During the June 5 meeting of the Sigourney City Council, the council debated a resolution to give large salary increases to employees in the coming fiscal year. Most employees listed would receive a raise of somewhere between 10 and 20%, with the only exceptions being City Clerk Angie Alderson, who would receive a raise from $4,907 per month to $5,200 per month (8.15%) and a street and sanitation employee who would go from $17.15 per hour to $23.50 per hour (36.95%). These new salaries would reduce the gap in pay between senior and newer employees. Councilman Ed Conrad, explained that, in his view, people doing the same job should be paid the same amount unless they are significantly more experienced.

Councilwoman Connie McLaughlin explained that, while she believes the city has a good staff made up of dependable employees, she opposes these raises. She explained that, on May 28, she, Mayor Jimmy Morlan and four city employees had a meeting to discuss wages. However, the handout with the recommended wages, made by the Finance Committee consisting of Conrad, Councilman Gary Iosbaker and Councilwoman Stephani Lentz, had already been given to the employees by the time she arrived. McLaughlin stated that one employee was rude and acted like the wages had already been decided upon, even though final approval is given by the city council. She stated she felt blindsided and that it was an “unpleasant and offensive” situation.

“I will not be intimidated or bullied by an employee who threatens to leave the city if they don’t receive these type of wages. I cannot imagine any other business, in this town or anywhere, that would allow this type of behavior...To me, that’s unacceptable. I would not have wished that on any one of you guys,” said McLaughlin.

McLaughlin stated that, even though subcommittee meetings are meant to be confidential, one employee shared the handouts the morning after the meeting, resulting in disgruntled employees asking why they were getting different sized raises. She stated that Sigourney doesn’t have a lot of turnover and shouldn’t expect a new employee to make the same as an experienced employee. McLaughlin stated that, in each of the twelves years she’d been on the council, the council had given out raises, then listed out the specific raise rate amounts for each year.

“No one is ever satisfied. They will always want more,” said McLaughlin. “If this resolution is passed, these outrageous increases will come at a price to the city of $77,105.60, not including overtime. And it needs to stop. I’m a firm believer that if you permit it, you promote it. And I’m opposed to what is being proposed here tonight.”

McLaughlin advocated giving 4% raises across the board. Councilman Randy Schultz stated that, even with past raises, Sigourney employees are still paid less than similar employees working in other cities, and that the large raises would help that. He stated he would prefer for the raises to be spread out over several years, but that the council works one year at a time. Schultz noted that the council had already approved utility prices, which would help pay for the raises.

McLaughlin stated she was never informed that the utility price increases were done to support raises and that she would not have approved the first or second readings of the new ordinances if she knew raises of this size were coming. She stated the public was misinformed about the reasons for the utility increases. Morlan stated the utility increases weren’t directly related to the salaries. Schultz disagreed.

Conrad explained that the proposed raises were made after different departments submitted budget proposals. Iosbaker stated that the raises were recommended out of a motivation to prevent current employees from being a “flight risk” and moving to other communities. Conrad stated the goal was to give a fair wage for the value of the work presented.

“I think that the struggle all communities deal with with employees is retention,” said Schultz. “And if they’re not paid in a comparable way to employees doing the same work, then they do look at going elsewhere. And I think that’s most demonstrated here today with the police department…We find ourselves trying to fill positions that we’re not competitive. I would hate to see that spread beyond the police department, into the other departments where we have a lot of invested training.”

Councilman Adam Clark stated he was concerned that, if wages were comparable across the board, it could create rifts between employees, if an employee who does more work is paid the same wage. Conrad said he understood, but countered that rifts can also form if the opposite happens, where employees who do the same work are paid different wages. Clark said he agreed Sigourney needed competitive wages to keep people here. He asked if Sigourney does employee evaluations, which could help determine who deserved higher wages. Alderson stated employee evaluations have not been done since 2017. Conrad asked why.

Schultz stated employees dislike evaluations and skip them, making them worthless, and that no one wants to put down anything negative about their coworkers. He stated that evaluations are great if done by department heads, consistently and regularly with terms set out, but had not been done that way in the past. Morlan stated that, if employees leave, it will be hard to find replacements, even with higher wages being offered, giving the struggle to find police officers as an example. Clark said he would be fine with the raises if the city also began doing yearly evaluations again. Iosbaker agreed that evaluations were essential.

Clark suggested tabling the raises until after the HR committee could meet and discuss evaluations. Conrad said he wasn't in favor of tabling things, because it will take more than a month for HR to sort out evaluations and the new fiscal year begins in less than a month. Morlan stated that most departments have very few employees and that department heads know how their employees are doing. Clark stated that the number of employees shouldn’t dictate if evaluations are necessary and that employees want evaluations too, so they know what they do good and bad.

When the resolution was put to a vote, Clark hesitated for several seconds before voting yes. McLaughlin voted no. Everyone else voted yes.

Later in the meeting, Public Works Director Don Northup claimed that he was the employee McLaughlin was talking about. He stated that he was belittled and told he didn’t do a good enough job to get a raise, leading him to walk out of the meeting.

At the same meeting, the council approved allowing the city’s insurance to be used for the Fountain Festival, which is tentatively scheduled for August 24, from 5-9 p.m., and will feature vendors, activities, music, and business booths. The council approved a request to begin offering 6 a.m. lap swim at the city pool. According to Alderson, the pool director has received four requests for the earlier lap swim and intends to keep offering it if the pool gets at least six attendees. The council accepted a letter of resignation from Alderson, who plans to retire in a few months.