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Council debates pay‑study rollout, COLA and merit structure as staff proposes a $2.2M implementation
Summary
Council discussed a staff‑completed pay study, proposed implementation costs and how to combine pay‑study adjustments with COLA/merit; staff proposed implementation in the FY25‑26 budget and offered to provide the full study and position‑level impacts to council for review.
Councilmembers pressed staff for more detail on a recently completed pay study and how the city plans to implement the consultant’s recommendations. CFO Laura Storrs told council the pay study offered recommended minimums for job classifications and that staff proposed bringing employees below those minimums up to the new minimums. Storrs said the proposed one‑time cost to implement pay‑study adjustments is about $2,200,000 (annualized cost including benefits).
Council members expressed two recurring concerns: (1) implementation timing and transparency, and (2) how pay‑study adjustments interact with proposed COLA and merit allocations. Several councilmembers said they expected to review the pay‑study results before staff implemented wide changes in the proposed budget; Storrs explained the budget includes the recommended implementation so employees below market minimums are not immediately disadvantaged if the council implements a COLA for the full year.
On COLA and merit, staff presented a draft approach budgeted as a combined “2% COLA plus 2% merit” for civilians and separate flat increases for sworn staff (Storrs said 5% for police and 4% for fire). Councilmembers debated alternatives such as a smaller COLA and a larger merit pool (for example, 1% COLA and 3% merit) to preserve stronger performance incentives. Council members also asked for metrics showing recent merit payouts and the distribution of proposed pay‑study increases by position so they could evaluate the risk of compressing top performers and understaffing critical roles.
Storrs agreed to provide the full pay‑study report, a departmental rollup showing how many positions and employees would receive increases and the budgetary impact of alternative COLA/merit combinations. Councilmembers asked staff to return with options showing 1/3‑ vs. 2/2‑type splits and how those would change the total budget impact and the distribution of raises by department.
No final decision was adopted at the workshop; staff requested council direction so staff could model changes and return with final budget options.
