Travis County Commissioners Court
June 17, 2008
Item A3
A3 is results, recommendations and other compensation related items. A, classified job titles, pay grades, designations for job families including the courts, senior and middle management professional support training, education and instruction, reproduction, public information, human resources, information technology and special project elections. B, cost analysis results including green circled slots and general market adjustment. And c, livable wage rate, if we could discuss this until 11:00.
>> we will be brief. I believe we can accomplish the presentation by 11:00. You are familiar with the work we do throughout the year under the designated titles that the judge just read. We complete a full job analysis on those titles to determine whether or not our pay is competitive with the market. And that, of course, ties in with the compensation philosophy that you have held to, that you approved our doing these that is annually for the past six years, and this is our sixth year in doing that. The methodology and that we apply is -- you had charged us to take a look at our internal market also once your equity within. Within the last year, these titles that are the job families that are represented were actually analyzed last in f.y. '03. And the i.t. Titles included were analyzed and presented to you the results in f.y. '04. In general, we found a two pay grade increase in the pay grades of the titles that we recommended. And what I would like to do is actually refer to you page 5 of your backup, which is the spread sheet which will provide with you the roll-up roll-uptotals on the work and recommendations that we're submitting. Page 5 spread sheet. As indicated earlier, we had a total of nine job families. Of those nine job families, 35 of your departments were affected by the work that we did. There were some 219 titles that we had as we went into the study. When we completed the study, we're actually proposing additional titles, which has taken us to a total of 228 titles. Approximately eight, I believe, or so additional titles than what we're proposing. The job titles, 200 plus, represents 1,096 slots throughout the county. There's an average, as I indicated here, of a plus two pay grade increase among all of the work that was done. That represents 1,075 upgrades among the title. We had one downgrade that was represented and requested by the department. In addition to that, 71 of those titles it was necessary to reclassify those based on reorganizations and other business needs within the departments. There were 142 red-lined employees as we went into the study, and we're ending our work with zero of those titles being red lined at this point because the market had shifted to accommodate that. The result of all of this work, and we can back into any detail that you would want, is that of the 1,075 titles that 1,096 titles that we reviewed, 246 of those are green circles, which means, of course, they are being paid below the market pay rates that we're recommending. In addition to that, we're making a recommendation that 756 of the titles be affected by the market adjustments, the concept that you implemented on last year and we're recommending again that that would be in place for these particular titles. When we look in terms of total costs, the green circled costs for 246 slots, general fund alone, is 608,318. The market adjustment costs for the 756 slots would be $540,374. With 18% benefit calculation, the total for the job analysis project would be $1,148,692. We still have minor cleanups to do on the departments on some of the titles that are included in this report. We're not expecting that they will be so significant that they would impact at a great extent the totals that we're presenting to you today. That's the brief report. We can back into the detail if you might would want in terms of questions.
>> if we act on these in three weeks, is that soon enough?
>> for us it would be. For p.b.o. Would it be?
>> that's fine.
>> would it be okay? And by that time, judge, we would have an opportunity to continue to work with the very few issues, if you will, that are remaining with the departments and have it complete complete at that time.
>> we will also have a couple of other items. You have livable wage today, but we have -- will bring forward a federal minimum wage, temp and seasonal salary for employees and bilingual supplemental pay. And by the end of the week I'll get you the whole list with a checklist so you can keep up with all the other items that deal with compensation and also when they were brought before you when you acted and when we expect to bring them forward again.
>> and just as a very brief add-on to this is that we're currently at a livable wage rate of $10 per hour, and we're recommending through this study that for f.y. '09 that we move it to $11 an hour. That's consistent with the local market, city of Austin as well as u.t. And others have adopted the $11 pay.
>> it seems pretty --
>> we need to see the fiscal impact.
>> with the thaxz you took today, I'm sure it will have some impact on --
>> $11 an hour.
>> looking to make it effective October 1 anyway, right?
>> yes.
>> we can't have more than a handful of folk affected by the federal minimum wage, right?
>> the election workers are affected by that.
>> the election day workers that we have several slots in that title that are below our 7.25. We need to work with p.b.o. To reconcile that costing number, and once we do that, then we'll present that total to you.
>> and we're working with the county clerk on that also?
>> yes.
>> mr. Powell?
>> yes, sir. Kind of a question, clarification and then a comment. The numbers that were presented to the court, the million plus to implement the market adjustments for the affected families, is that based on the same market adjustment matrix that was used last year of if you move up one pay grade it's one percent and additional half a percent? And I want you to understand that that's what you adopted last year, but the adoption of that matrix and that kind of approach to funding markets is way off of fully funding that market. I just want you to be clear on that. When an employee moves up a pay grade at Travis County, that should result in a 7% salary adjustment for that individual, all things being equal, they maintain their current level, they just noof me up a pay grade, that's a 7%. What you are being asked to consider is give that employee not 7% but 1% which puts them further behind the market. It is a step in the right direction, but it is an infant step in the right direction, and I think it's -- that kind of approach that has skewed the compensation plan here at Travis County. For instance, if you are looking at an employee that's going to be moving up three pay grades, what they would be receiving under this matrix is a 2% salary increase versus a 21% salary increase that the market dictates that they should be receiving. Okay? I just -- I want you to fully understand the implications of just kind of arbitrarily assigning numbers to what the market says you should be doing. 1% has nothing to do with what the market dictates should be done on that employee's pay. That's just a number that has been grabbed for budgetary purposes or political expediency. I don't know where it comes from, but it has no relation to the reality of what that employee's pay should be as dictated by the market. And that's -- I want to make that clear in this. If you adopt this matrix as a part of this, we are continuing a 10-year trend of not funding these market studies adequately and putting our employees and you in a worse financial position when we get around, if ever, to addressing this problem fully. I just wanted to make sure that's clear.
>> good morning, judge, Commissioners, tanya with the sheriff's office. Greg is absolute right. We're not adequately funding the market. We're doing compensation fixes for individual departments and sworn personnel that's market driven, and we're leaving a significant group of civilians behind. The current rate of funding -- or the current method that we use for funding market studies also negatively impacts ten youred or significantly -- individuals with significantly more education or experience or skill sets or licenses than the minimum. They stand to be compensated exactly the same as new employees or employees with less experience. What we also have done is set up a system where those tenured employees stand the risk of having a new employee come in with less education and be paid higher than the market. We need to fix this system. The system is not meeting the retension piece of our compensation philosophy. We're falling way short and leaving committed, dedicated employees behind. We have to do better.
>> this is on what we're discussing?
>> the work sheet that debbie just handed out is providing you some examples of pay scale movement from the last market studies.
>> okay.
>> if you'll look at page 2, these are sample employees from the market study that was conducted in '06 for funding in '07. The first thing you see there is an interpreter. At the time of the study, they were classified as a pay range 13. The market study result was they were seven pay grades behind, which is 49% behind the median market to which they are measured. Each example gives you an employee at one step above minimum and an employee that was at mid-point. You can see that after -- after the market study with the cost of living in green circle that was provided, the tenured employee is still 8.5% behind market. Pre-market there was 18.9% distinction between the employee at a 13-1 and the employee at 13 mid. After the market, there's no distinction between the two. They are being compensated as if they have equal experience and education. The next page provides you the same examples from '07 market analysis for funding in '08. We got a little better. As greg said, we took an instant step toward keeping people compressed at the minimum of the market scale, but we're still way off. We have people who are senior level counselors and senior level social workers that are being compensated less at raise time than minimum folks. In a priority for this court has been mental health issues, and that's hard work. It's hard riding the ride of people with mental illness all day long. If we're committed to doing something about mental health, we need to pay our mental health professionals. The third page provided here walks you through the inequities created internally when you fully fund a market study as we fully funded pops last year. I'm providing you examples here of job clatsz, an attorney 1, a social worker, counselor senior, an accountant senior as compared to a corrections officer senior, I've provided you the minimum job qualifications for education and experience. You can see that a master's level social worker requires a master's degree, two years experience and a license. They are paid at starting $3,400 less a year than a corrections officer senior. If you go to the second part, you can see a psychologist with a ph.d. As a minimum requirement, plus two years experience, is paid $15,000 less than a corrections sergeant starting. That's significant. We have to do better.
>> would h.r. -- has h.r. Seen this and would rr agree with this.
>> jobs are valued differently in the market and I can't state that just because these positions are not paid comparable tore the law enforcement titles we would not consider those a match nor competitive to what the market says. We're just saying for the first time today if you would like for to us take a look and provide you with feedback, we would be happy to do.
>> y'all, I mean the point I make on this, this is not when we need to see this in July. Not when we're about -- I mean, we've had preliminary budgets submitted. This is what happens to the court every year. We have this, we sit here and we look at this and we try to follow this, and even though I think that all of us can deal with the numbers, this is not the way to do this. I mean, this has got to be vetted, this has got to be brought and sat down with h.r. And this done through -- I mean so it's really part of the preliminary budget. Because it has the potential -- you might as well take the preliminary budget and just burn it. And say why are we even, you know, moving forward with the preliminary budget?
>> [multiple voices]
>> let me go ahead and clarify. In all fairness, we had sat down with the sheriff's department, tanya and debbie and greg earlier on, and what they are referring to is compa ratio. It is a solid compensation theory that says if you move someone up in a pay grade, they should maintain their level, their step level. In other words, while we go from a 18 to 20 and I'm step 5, I would maintain a step 5 when I go to the 20. It is a theory that we have and something that the court used the first -- I think first and second year that we did market salary survey. It proved to be very, very expensive. Greg is correct when he says that the matrix that we are using for the market adjustment has been adjusted per budget. That was a step, a small step, albeit, but a step towards some of the equity -- addressing some of the equity issues that have been brought up here. The court could choose to use comp ratio. It is cost, at issue of money, but the -- the standard is solid and it's just a method of implementing the market salary survey. It wouldn't impact the results, it would be how you implemented and the cost of that implementation that would really be impacted.
>> why don't you analyze this for us and in three weeks let's discuss it again. Plus, let's check with the other major employers in the area, you know, and see how common it is to use a comp ratio.
>> okay.
>> city of Austin, lcra, the other governmental, quasi governmentable and I guess some of the large private employers too and see.
>> judge, that's our point, and we understand the cost. And if you were to do it even for just those job families in this year's market, we realize it's costly. However, you know, the
>> [inaudible] has been set and we understand and appreciate it and it does make a difference when you fully fund a market study that you receive. It helps us, you know, what pops has done for us has been tremendous in both the retention and the recruiting. And now we have tenured employees on the other pay scale that have been here for years and through market studies have basically lost their tenure, lost their education, lost their skills that they had come in with. So market studies brought the pay grade up, but it's not kept them up with their steps. And that makes a difference in recruiting and retaining. We may recruit because the market study brought the pay grade up higher, but it brings that new person we recruited in higher than the tenured employee and that's the difficulty we're having.
>> can I ask a question regarding y'all's stats here? -- they are point of pages 2 -- actually I guess page 4 to show that where on the pops we are funding at least to market mid-point? On the other job families we're fund to go market minimum bus 1 to 3%?
>> absolutely. I'm not certain, though, that pops was the median of their market that we funded.
>> arguably --
>> it was the proper end of their marketment and the point to illustrate this is that we fix people on the pay determination guide based on their education and experience. And when we do a market study that looks at the minimum and the mid-point, the assumption is that all the pay steps in between move with that. There's a set percentage between those points. The entire scale moves and we're not moving our tenured and educated employees with it.
>> the low end of the scale up?
>> right. Absolutely. And you take a bilingual skill set which people are fixed in the matrix and compensated for until they are wrapped up in a market study and they go backwards. They are no longer compensated based on their peer group. And the counselors, I'll say this about the counselors in social services, in two years they were wrapped up in a market study. Or the last two times they were wrapped up in a market study, both times it was 14% below the median market. We have consistently under valued and underpaid these folks and we need to change the way we look at that. I apologize for this information coming to you late. We put it together fast when we realized this was going to be here. It is important we look at it in preliminary. Preliminary is about to be out. We need to address these issues. We need to start with the job families we have this year.
>> the problem is we'll have a full compliment of court members in three weeks. I didn't just pull that out of the air. Next week we'll only have three. The week after that three or four. Should have five three weeks from today.
>> which was those provided coal last for each of those years?
>> I think all relevant compensation information should be looked at and basically presented to us until you look at it and try to be fair. I don't know that. Subject to the availability of funds. That would be said many times between now and markup, unfortunately, because as we get the revenue information, it's important to say that. In three weeks, if you all would get together and give us any additional information if you can a week before the meeting it would help us.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, June 17, 2008 2:31 PM