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Employee Compensation Committee Meeting
Date: 1/15/09 8:07 – 9:00am
Present: Janet Cathcart, member, Michael Storch, member, Scott Jenssen, Member, Maynard Forbes, Director of Operations, Gareth Backhaus, Chief of Police, Barbara Gauthier, Town Accountant and Melissa Noe, Inter-Departmental Secretary
- J. Cathcart spoke with R. Tryon and let him know that the committee wasn’t going to address the salary for a new Fire Chief and the proposed benefits R. Tryon asked be looked into.
- The minutes from 12.2.08, 12.16.08 and 1.7.09 minutes were approved and posted on the town website.
- The committee discussed the Town Accountant’s recommendation to make a standardized policy that part time or elected officials as of July 1, 2009 will no longer be offered health insurance. She has the official response from Town Counsel on how this should be handled; it does not need to go to a Town Meeting vote. The committee agreed to make a recommendation to the Select Board to have a standardized policy, effective July 1, 2009, that health insurance is only available to full time employees and that elected and part-time employees are not eligible.
- The committee discussed the recommendation to eliminate the Board of Registrar’s Clerk line item and combine the position with the Town Clerk’s position since this is performed by the same person. It was agreed that by doing this it will make it more transparent that the job is performed by one position. The committee is going to recommend that the Select Board revisit the separation/consolidation of the Board of Registrars Clerk and Town Clerk line items as they are related to a single position. They will also recommend that the parameters of the job description and salary for that the position be clarified. The committee felt that this would be the time to review this since it is understood that the person currently holding this office is not going to run when her term expires this year.
- Vacation, pay and sick issues:
- Monterey is the only town that does not offer a 4th week of vacation to its full time employees no matter how long they’ve been employed by the town. Most towns give 4 weeks of vacation after 10 years. Monterey currently offers 2 weeks after 1 year and 3 weeks after 6 years. After some discussion and multiple suggestions it was decided that the committee is going to recommend that the current vacation policy be changed from 2 weeks at 2 years and 3 weeks at 6 years to 1 week after 1 year (for when new employees are hired), 2 weeks after 2 years, 3 weeks after 5 years and 4 weeks after 11 years.
- G. Backhaus provided a sample of an earned time off policy from a local business that allows their employees to earn “XX” amount of hours for each week of hours worked. J. Cathcart felt that if this was something we were going to look at we’d have to come up with a line item and the cost of this change.
- The Town Accountant provided the committee with an estimated amount of money needed if the town were to offer a sick time payout. The estimate is as follows for the 7 full time positions:
Estimated cost of sick time payout
Employee # Hourly Rate Daily Rate 15 days Cost
1 $ 29.88 $ 239.04 $ 3,585.60
2 $ 24.65 $ 197.20 $ 2,958.00
3 $ 20.74 $ 165.92 $ 2,488.80
4 $ 20.76 $ 166.08 $ 2,491.20
5 $ 19.58 $ 156.64 $ 2,349.60
6 $ 18.05 $ 144.40 $ 2,166.00
Subtotal: $ 16,039.20
Employee 7 (not filled)
$ 14.85 $ 118.80 $ 1,782.00
Total: $ 17,821.20
- After 90 days were banked by all employees the table above shows the amount it would cost per year for all 7 employees to buyout their additional 15 days earned if not used. If the money wasn’t used it would go back in the general fund. The chances of the total amount budgeted being used up every year is not very likely. The committee is going to recommend that an employee be given the option to cash out up to 15 days of sick time earned but not used at the end of each fiscal year after their maximum of 90 sick days allowed to be banked has been met. Note: if an employee didn't take any sick days, it takes 6 years to bank 90 days. Only after the full 90 days is banked would an employee have days to be paid out if unused.
- Dental Insurance:
- P. Mielke provided J. Cathcart with more information. Only 3 employees are needed to join and the amounts provided last week in the estimate assumed that the town was not paying anything. If the town were to pay 25% of the cost it to the employee would be for Plan 1: $31.29 for an individual and $88.14 for a family a month and Plan 3: $37.42 for an individual and $110.27 for a family a month. The highway employees reviewed the plans and the amounts given and the available dentists and decided that it was not worth it. The committee agreed to not pursue this further.
- Employee review process:
- The committee felt that the process needed to be improved and that there needed to be more feedback with the employees. The employees felt that they should be given a blank copy first to evaluate themselves and then have the Board do the review. The employee’s timeliness, job performance, etc need to be addressed regularly. There also needs to be a set schedule when the reviews are to be done and they should be done at the same time every year and done in private. The committee is going to recommend that the Select Board formalize, standardize and schedule the review process. The recommendation to review merit based raises will be visited next year.
- Highway Salaries:
- M. Forbes provided his suggested raises to get him and his employees up to par. The committee took copies of his recommendations and will review this at their next meeting.
- The next meeting will be at 8am on Wednesday the 21st.
- The Employee Compensation Committee is scheduled to present their recommendations to the Select Board at the Select Board’s February 2nd meeting at 5pm.
Submitted by:
Melissa Noe, Inter-Departmental Secretary
Approved by:
Employee Compensation Committee Members
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