Council adopts compensation study recommendations and approves related MOUs and budget changes

Crescent City — The City Council adopted Evergreen Consulting’s compensation and classification recommendations and approved a suite of memoranda of understanding with employee groups, along with a budget amendment to partially implement changes.

Evergreen Consulting presented a study that compared Crescent City pay and benefits to peer organizations and found the city’s total compensation generally lagged the market by about 5%. The consultant recommended a market-responsive pay plan and reassignment of classifications to new pay grades; the vendor proposed several implementation options and cost estimates to bring the city closer to market.

Council and staff discussed affordability. Staff described a practicable implementation the bargaining units had negotiated: the creation of a step 6 to expand pay-range spread, a minimum 2% adjustment for most employees, a proposed 12% action for the police department with a July cost-of-living adjustment, and different treatments across bargaining units to manage compression and internal equity. Staff said that full market catch-up in one year would be unaffordable but the package adopted represented a financially negotiated approach agreed with bargaining units.

Council adopted multiple resolutions and MOUs (citations in staff materials) and approved a budget amendment allocating approximately $423,000 citywide split across funds to cover the near-term cost of the agreements. The management employee MOU was approved separately with disclosure/recusal noted where applicable.