Enterprise council introduces ordinances to raise mayor salary and create pay bands for department heads

City Manager Jonathan Tullos said the city will introduce two ordinances to change elected-official compensation and to create pay bands and merit increases for nonstatutory department heads.

Tullos told the council that a recent League of Municipalities wage survey showed Enterprise’s mayoral pay lagged peer cities and that the proposed ordinance would increase the mayor’s salary to $57,000. He said the change would not affect current officeholders and, if approved, would take effect after the next election. "If you look at smaller communities...you would have evidence to suggest that our mayor's salary is under the market value," City Manager Jonathan Tullos said.

The council also introduced ordinance 012125A to set hiring procedures and pay bands for nonstatutory department heads, allowing department supervisors and the mayor to recommend merit increases within established pay bands rather than returning every pay decision to the full council. Tullos said statutory positions (fire, police, clerk and treasurer) would remain appointments under statute but be paid within a pay band.

Mayor Cooper and several council members supported circulating the underlying wage study to council members before the Feb. 4 meeting; Tullos said he would resend the study on request. The ordinances were introduced and laid over to the Feb. 4 meeting to allow two weeks for review before final consideration.

The council did not vote to adopt either ordinance at the Jan. 21 meeting; both were scheduled for further consideration on Feb. 4. The ordinance establishing the mayor’s salary cites the Code of Alabama 1975; the meeting record referenced that statutory framework when explaining timing for changes to elected-official pay.