Board to address county wages Monday

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BY CHUCK VANDENBERG
PCC EDITOR

LEE COUNTY - Lee County Supervisors will hold a special fifth monthly meeting Monday to discuss proposed county wage increases.

The board typically doesn't meet on fifth Mondays but board chair Matt Pflug called the meeting due to the pressing wage concerns in the county.

The Lee County Compensation Board has recommended a 10% across the board wage increase for county elected officials, and a 45% increase for the Lee County Sheriff's Department administrators including Sheriff Stacy Weber, Chief Deputy Will Conlee, Captain Craig Burch and Jail Administrator John Canida.

The recommendations are based on a formula approved in the Back the Blue bill the legislature approved and Gov. Kim Reynolds signed during the the 2021 session.

That bill set the sheriff's salary's across the state at a median average based on comparable community, county and state law enforcement administrators salaries.

Iowa Code says the board of supervisors can reduce the Compensation Board's recommendation, but has to reduce it equally across the county. If the board reduces the sheriff's recommendation by 50% they have to also reduce the remaining county officials salaries by the same percentage.

Most of the county department heads have approached the board with a proposed 10% increase in wages for their staff during January budget hearings.

The move prompted Lee County Budget Director Cindy Renstrom to propose a $1 million increase in the county's general supplemental funding, which would result in a 11% increase in the supplemental portion of the county's general mil levy.

That increase would require a supermajority vote of the supervisors, which amounts to 4 of 5 supervisors in favor of the increase.

Both chairman Pflug and board member Ron Fedler hedged at last week's meeting about the increase saying the county has to be fiscally responsible.

Over the past six years, the county has seen a decrease in fund balance of about 70%, while valuations in the county have risen over the past three years.

Even with the increase to the supplemental levy, Renstrom told the board last Monday that the county total levy will actually go down due to the state taking over mental health operations which eliminated that portion of property taxes and expenses from county budgets.

Lee County Sheriff Stacy Weber has said publicly on numerous occasions that he is troubled by the optics of the increase. Although he told supervisors the increase puts Lee County on par with other law enforcement agencies, he's concerned that the state-mandated increase will hurt the chances for other county employees to also see a raise proportional to the market.

"This is the year of the employee," Weber told the board last week. "We have to take care of our people and those deputies deserve that raise."

Lee County Auditor Denise Fraise mirrored Weber's comments in her remarks to the board last week saying the 10% increase goes a ways in wiping out past year's small increases that have Lee County officials behind comparable officers in other counties in terms of pay.

The Lee County Conference Board met on Thursday and Assessor Kandi White also brought in a budget with a 10% wage increase across the department.

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