Commissioners weigh tiered pay increases, bonuses and health-care subsidy as staff options cost millions

Budget staff presented multiple compensation scenarios and cost estimates and recommended a baseline 2% recurring COLA while also providing higher and tiered alternatives.

"The 2% is 2.5, and that's not a bad choice," a member of the budget team said when walking commissioners through staff scenarios and updated head-count adjustments. Staff produced side-by-side scenarios that showed combinations of recurring COLA and one-time bonuses, and supplied county-level net cost estimates after typical state and federal reimbursements.

Staff gave example totals: a bundle with higher tiered increases and a one-time bonus produced an estimated net county cost of about $3.8 million in one scenario; a straight 4% COLA, after employer costs and benefits, was shown on the spreadsheet as roughly $4.89 million to the county. Commissioners asked staff to model a tiered approach that places higher percentage increases on lower-paid salary bands (for example, a larger percent for employees under $50,000) while reducing the percentage for higher salary bands; staff said they could return with those modeled banded scenarios.

Several commissioners noted local inflation and recruitment pressures while discussing options. "I'm at a 4% COLA," Commissioner Adams said, citing consumer-price and local labor-market pressures. Vice Chairwoman Jones also urged meaningful increases to protect purchasing power for lower-paid county staff.

Commissioners requested the following follow-ups from staff: a tiered COLA proposal showing bands (0'$50k, $50'$100k, $100'$200k, >$200k) and the resulting recurring and one-time costs; the projected county-dollar impact after reimbursements for each option; and a separate estimate showing the cost to offset next-year health-care premium increases for employees as an alternate form of compensation. Staff agreed to deliver updated spreadsheets and comparative totals ahead of Monday's meeting.