Raising concerns

At a special meeting on Friday, the county commissioners chose to address raise requests for the next fiscal year by allocating an amount per employee to be distributed by the head of each department. This cuts a significant chunk from the amount originally requested while allowing elected officials to continue their efforts to bring salaries in line internally and ensure they are competitive.

The total originally requested by the various county departments to go towards raises this year was $101,000, said County Clerk Linda Fritz. If the commissioners opted to give a blanket 2% raise instead, this would drop by around a half; the third option would be to give each department head $1000 per employee and leave it to them to allocate the funding in the best manner possible.

There was some debate as to whether the county should be considering raises at all this year, considering the fiscal climate. Commissioner Kelly Dennis felt it would lead to “personnel cuts a year from now” because things are not going to get better between now and then considering the effects of the pandemic and the state of the energy industry.

“I just can’t justify it,” he said.

Sheriff Jeff Hodge agreed, saying that, in a perfect year, he would be on board with the idea of ensuring salaries are both fair internally and competitive in the region. However, he said, “I would rather have my people have a job next year”.

Hodge said he had spoken with members of his department and they had mostly agreed they would rather have a job next year than a raise this year.

Commissioner Fred Devish, however, felt that raises have not been consistent in the past and are now somewhat uneven between employees. “Somewhere in there, we got behind,” he said.

Devish stated that he would rather take a small bite now than wait five years and be a long way behind on what the county is paying people compared to what they could be earning elsewhere.

“I would go with something. I think the department heads and electeds probably should get some money to level the playing field,” he said. Commissioner Jeanne Whalen agreed.

The county’s elected officials have been working for several years on a pay scale matrix in an attempt to create a standard for employees in each department. The point of this is to fix the arbitrary nature of the pay increases that have been given in the past, said County Attorney Joe Baron.

The matrix factors in such things as the job marketplace and is considered by position, not person, he said. “Some of these jobs aren’t competitive, some of them are,” he stated.

Baron addressed budget concerns by suggesting that Crook County may not suffer as much as some are predicting.

“I keep hearing there is going to be less money next year than this year, I just don’t see that occurring,” he said. Not only is mineral production not currently a big factor here, he said, the county will have a new pipeline in place soon that will add around $6 to 10 million to the county valuation.

Even in the financial crisis of 2007-09, said Baron, sales tax revenue only dropped by 6%. Historically, it has never dropped by more than 10% and, considering the pipeline will raise the sales tax, Baron said he does not foresee revenue drops being a long-term situation.

Oil has been declining here for years, he said; there may have been one or two holes drilled this year in the whole county. Crook County does not receive coal money, and while state funding may be impacted, Baron said it appears they are trying to backfill that shortage.

“We need to look at this thing on a long-term basis. We do have several million dollars plus in restricted funds and in savings, and if bad times aren’t when you use [those], I don’t know what you use them for,” he said.

Following this discussion, the commissioners opted to approve the option to give department heads $1000 per employee to be divided up at that department head’s discretion.