Travis County Commssioners Court
May 4, 2004
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Item 28
28 should be real quick. Review status of the f.y. '05 salary setting process for elected officials and take appropriate action.
>> the question before you is whether to reinvigorate the advisory committee on elected officials salaries. As background, two years ago the citizens advisory committee on elected officials' salaries was reconvened. That committee used a statistical model to show expected salaries based on market conditions. The statistical model showed rather large salary increases for most officials. There was one that was a negative, two that were 4 or 5%; there were seven that showed 10 to 15% and I think four or five showing more than 20%. The committee two years ago made recommendations for salary increases ranging from zero to 6%. Primarily because there wasn't a long enough track record using the statistical methodology and there was a possibility the results my be skewed and in addition the economic conditions in Austin just did not seem to support large salary increases. The court took the committee's recommendations two years ago and awarded even smaller salary increases ranging from zero to 3% on an annualized basis. Last year the committee was not reconvened, back in June of '03, the court decided not to bring the committee forward primarily because it did not look very likely that there would be any consideration of pay increases for elected officials. Some elected officials did receive pay increase in '03 and '04, but no additional funding was provided for rank and file employees for performance based pay during that same period, each of you at different times have expressed a desire that hopefully for '05 there will be resources available for rank and file. Now, at the direction of the p.b.o. Subcommittee, members of the staff for the elected officials salary committee contacted for long-standing members of this citizens advisory committee and basically asked them do you believe that it was necessary to reconvene the committee if -- given contemporary circumstances. And the response was that if the court concluded that elected officials would be receiving the same or similar increases as rank and file, that they did not believe that it would be necessary because the data of two years ago showed such a disparity between the market conditions and what they actually were receiving. So it doesn't seem necessary to do so, but we wanted to put this before you and to gain your thoughts about our recommendation, which is to move forward with the budget process in the absence of firing up the citizens advisory committee and under the assumption that there would be some resources available for rank and file ann hrebgtd officials would get -- elected officials would get similar consideration.
>> questions, comments? So basically the recommendation is not to have the advisory committee do additional work.
>> right.
>> unless we need it, we think we can find in the most recent report.
>> that's correct.
>> move approval of the recommendation that we not have the elected officials salary setting committee do additional work at this time.
>> second.
>> can we just send them a nice thank you note, christian?
>> yes.
>> sign it on behalf of the Commissioners court. This time with the deauthorization.
>> you mean from you or me? Or me, I would be happy to.
>> all in favor. That passes by unanimous vote. Thank you, mr. Smith.
Last Modified: Wednesday, May 5, 2004 7:38 AM