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City staff recommends interim pay adjustments from compensation study; council split on timing
Summary
City staff told the council the general fund finished the year about $6.1 million above projections and proposed a $280,000 interim budget amendment to begin pay adjustments for seven payrolls; some council members urged waiting until next fiscal year to prioritize capital needs or tax relief.
City staff told the Hardeeville City Council that the general fund ended the year roughly $6.1 million higher than anticipated and proposed moving forward with pay adjustments recommended in a recent compensation study.
The finance team said the total cash change from the study would be about $818,444 and, after payroll taxes and retirement costs, annualized to about $1,042,632. Staff recommended a one-time budget amendment of roughly $280,000 to cover seven payrolls (the pay periods from April through the period that includes June 30), and said they could bring the amendment forward for a first reading on March 5 and a second reading on March 19 if the council wanted to act sooner.
Why it matters: staff argued acting now would establish a new baseline for pay and help with recruitment and retention, saying the report’s recommendations would be “detrimental to the organization” if not implemented and could hurt morale.
Council members raised timing and priority concerns. One councilmember said the city previously cited capital needs when declining a tax decrease and questioned whether the newly available funds should be directed to a fire station or used for tax relief rather than immediate raises. Another member said the recurring portion of the surplus would “just barely” cover the proposed increase and urged caution given uncertainty about future revenues.
Staff responded that portions of the extra revenue are non‑recurring (for example, proceeds the staff described as coming from a “nickel plate” settlement) and that the city had placed some of those proceeds into a rainy day fund and its capital improvement program. The city manager told the council staff would incorporate the compensation-study recommendations into the manager’s April budget proposal if the council preferred to delay action rather than introduce the March budget amendment.
The council did not introduce the ordinance at this meeting; staff said they would include the recommendations in the April budget presentation if that was council’s preference.
