A new week ahead. Are you following the Press series about the salaries of top public officials in our area’s cities, school districts and county? Think it’s a good idea to publish them? What positive outcomes can you foresee, if any?
Other topics, questions, comments?
I’m glad the Press is publishing them, but people need to understand that base salary is rarely the entire compensation picture for public employees. It would also be helpful to compare the base salaries of Coeur d’Alene, Post Falls, and Kootenai County public employees with similarly situated employees in comparable geographic areas across the state. The local cost of living in each area should also be factored in some way.
Beyond base salary, we have to know what other compensations are provided. We also need to know how administratively uncontrollable but mandatory overtime is compensated. What perquisites (housing allowance, education allowance, uniform allowance, home-to-work driving of a G-ride, etc.) are provided?
Comment by Bill — July 27, 2009 @ 9:43 am
Well things are slow here so I’ll share a joke.
DON’T MESS WITH OLD MEN
Grandpa gets summoned for an audit by the IRS. He shows up with his attorney and the auditor proceeds to tell him.
“Old man, you live a very extravagant lifestyle, but you have no job. We here at the IRS refuse to believe you make that much money gambling.”
Grandpa eyes the man and asks in return. “If I can show how I make so much money gambling will you leave me be?”
The auditor replies in the affirmative and the old man says, “I’ll bet you $1,000 I can bite my own eye.”
The auditor accepts the bet and gramps pops out his fake eye and gives it a chomp. Less than pleased the auditor admits to being tricked but won’t drop the audit whence the old man says, “well hows this, double or nothing that I can bit my other eye?”
The auditor can see that he’s not blind so he quickly agrees and the old man takes out his false teeth and lightly nips his eye.
Now the auditor feels really stupid and owes the guy $2,000 but is more angry than complacent.
The older gentleman decides to give him one more chance. “I tell you what. Lets go triple or nothing. I bet I can stand on one side of your desk and urinate directly into the trash can on the other side of the desk without getting a single drop anywhere but in the can.”
The auditor knows there has to be a trick but considering the guys advanced years it was an impossible bet to resist, so he agrees. The old guy gets up unzips his pants and urinates all over the auditors desk and inadvertently splashes the man himself.
Finally vindicated and debt free the auditor gleefully celebrates and says to the attorney. “I told you he was a fake how do you feel about him now!?”
The astonished attorney ruefully says, “Well I’m really not feeling very well. The old fart bet me $25,000 this morning that he could whiz all over your desk and you’d be happy about it.”
Comment by Wallypog — July 27, 2009 @ 2:53 pm
I have some salary administration experience at the policy making level. I chaired a Hay System Job Evaluation Executive Committee for the Idaho Legislature in 1976 when the State adopted a new employee compensation system. At that time benefits approximated 20% of the total position compensation.
I note with some dismay that taxpayers are now paying as high as 30%, in some of the CDA Press examples, and around 25% for most of the taxpayer paid compensations that have been published so far. A few days ago I stated on this blog that the 20% for benefits was still the norm. Over the weekend I asked a retail chain owner about his benefit package and he said it is about 12% but that 20% is a current benchmark for benefits.
So as the public looks at these salary amounts and compares them with private sector compensation and correctly questions a pile on of administration assistants with almost equal excessive pay, the more meaningful figure is the benefits. Too bad The Press did’nt go into more detail for this troubling part of the compensation for local government employees.
Comment by Gary Ingram — July 27, 2009 @ 3:32 pm
“It would also be helpful to compare the base salaries of Coeur d’Alene, Post Falls, and Kootenai County public employees with similarly situated employees in comparable geographic areas across the state.”
I’m not sure about the other taxing districts but the Idaho Association of Counties does an extensive salary and benefits survey that is on their website. Here is the address, click on the link, “2009 Salary Survey Results.”
I wonder Gary, what the retail chain owner was including in his 12% benefits figure? I wonder if that was actual benefits on top of the minimum required payroll amounts for SSI, workmans comp, unemployment taxes, etc.?
Anyway that link from IAC gives a pretty good comparison for counties all over Idaho. Perhaps at least the state association for cities has a similar link but I didn’t look for it.
Comment by Dan English — July 27, 2009 @ 9:50 pm
Well, I don’t know how to do all the magic to make a nice clean link to the counties salary survey but click on “publications” on the left side menu and then 2009 and you should get to the link I tried to post above. [Bill’s note: I cleaned it up. Just click on it, then click on the .xls to see all the data in spreadsheet form. If you’re using a Mac, some of the formulae will not carry forward.]
Comment by Dan English — July 27, 2009 @ 9:53 pm
Dan English,
Thanks for the link. I was particularly interested comparing the Kootenai County Sheriff’s Office (all positions) salaries with other office salaries throughout the state. In occasional and shallow news reports, Watson claims deputies have been leaving for better jobs paying higher salaries. Assuming Watson is being truthful and is not misrepresenting the numbers of resignations or the reason for resignations from his department, I suggest those who departed must be going to other states, because Kootenai County pays its sheriff’s employees comparably well, better than most in Idaho.
Comment by Bill — July 28, 2009 @ 7:02 am
I think the county overall has been pretty fair in trying to offer competitive salaries across the board within our budget authority. We will never be able to keep up with the larger cities and some other taxing districts because of the differences in mandated services for various taxing entities.
The Sheriff has said on several occassions that his “competitors” for officers end up being local (our larger cities and Spokane area) vs. other states or even regionally. I guess we’ll see how the salaries for police in the larger cities stack up against the county as further articles come out this week in the Press.
Comment by Dan English — July 28, 2009 @ 9:47 am
Open Session THURSDAY:
Word on the street and on the door of the Riverstone Auction Office is that the auction has been canceled. No sales = no tax increment. Let’s discuss the ramifications for LCDC and the city’s plans for downtown redevelopment using Riverstone TIF.
Comment by Gary Ingram — July 30, 2009 @ 9:36 pm
Is the sale of the bogus pond dependent upon a development success threshold?
Comment by Susie Snedaker — July 31, 2009 @ 8:14 am