Burke County commissioners indicated during a budget work session that they favor a 2 percent cost‑of‑living adjustment (COLA) plus continuation of the existing step plan for county employees, and asked staff to continue refining the budget to identify offsets for the additional cost.

County financial staff said a 2 percent COLA would add roughly $640,000 to the budget. “If you added 2% COLA, we add 640,000 to the budget,” Michael, a county staff member, said. Commissioners discussed the tradeoffs between funding COLA, funding steps, and using hiring freezes or delayed hires to offset costs.

Several commissioners expressed support for giving employees a COLA and keeping steps because of rising costs for households and county competitiveness for employees. Commissioners and staff discussed how implementation of steps occurs on anniversary dates across the year, and how partially paying for both COLA and steps would affect the current fiscal year only in part because many step increases become fully realized in the following fiscal year. Health insurance increases and pension contribution fluctuations were also discussed as budget pressures; staff said the county’s increase in health insurance costs was roughly $896,000 year‑over‑year for the county’s share.

No final appropriation was adopted during the work session. Commissioners set follow‑up work to refine budget cuts and identify offsets, and scheduled another budget work session to continue unresolved issues. The county manager and finance staff were directed to provide updated totals and options so the board can make a formal decision before required advertising and adoption deadlines.