Happy New Year, M&C

What seemed to end as a good year for county M&C employees was followed by a New Year that started very poorly for them. Their first raise in six years was suspended, and it suddenly depends on the action of a small number of Board members on the Administration Committee.

M&C stands for Managerial and Confidential, and anyone who works for the County who isn't in one of the unions is an M&C employee. I'm and M&C employee, as is my wife, who is a part-time Special Educator in the Department of Health.* Every January, the Board must, by law, set the salary for all these employees. For six years, the numbers have been the same, as we tried to claw ourselves out of the recession.

This last December, the Board and the Treasurer, Dan Crowell, worked to set out a proposed raise that provided any M&C employee who had worked over one year with a raise of 1% per year of longevity, with a cap at 5%. There was also a one-time payment of $100 for part-time and $200 for full time employees. The raises totaled about $160,000, money which was available from another line in the budget – a budget which was lean and fair and resulted in a tax levy increase of only 0.14%.

The December vote to transfer these funds – to provide the raise for these employees, some of whom made less than union workers they supervised – was very close. All seven Democrats voted for it, as well as one Republican: Jim Powers. The rest of the Republicans voted against it, but the weighted votes were in favor and it passed.

Today, at the first Board meeting of the new year, some bureaucratic complexities arose which I can explain in detail to anyone who is interested, but which are too convoluted to include in this post. Long story short, an opportunity appeared to send the raise to the Administration Committee (Admin), instead of approving it today. The new Board split along exactly the same lines as last time: All Democrats voted to approve the raise as passed by the last Board, and Jim Powers joined us again. All Republicans voted to send it to Admin. However, there are now more Republicans, and fewer Democrats, on the Board, and so the raise was sent to an uncertain future in committee (a committee comprised, this year, of four Republicans and one Democrat). Elections have consequences, and this truth was made evident within an hour of the new board being sworn in.

The new Chair of Admin, Ed Frazier of Unadilla, assured me that he would get the raise out of Admin and back to the full Board. I hope this happens, and I will be at the Admin meeting on January 23 at 9:15, in a non-voting role. It's an open meeting, and anyone can come.

If Admin approves the raise, then it still has to pass the full Board in February. The outcome of this issue may set the tone for a long time to come.

* - If the raise is saved, it will not include the Board members or the Treasurer; we have all exempted ourselves. My wife will make 36 cents an hour more, in a job where she can work no more than 20 hours a week. So this is not an issue that has a lot of personal impact. It's just a question of right and wrong.