“Contrary to Fact-Finder Guest, the conciliator believes that requiring adoption of a(n) incomplete performance pay plan in the hopes that the parties will then voluntarily resume bargaining, overcome mistrust and fill-in the missing details, is unsound,” Conciliator Alan Miles Ruben wrote in his Jan. 29 decision. “The sheriff would have no reason to give up any part of the discretion the award would give him to tailor the plan to conform with the wishes of the county commissioners.”
The county merit proposal was to award $600 for agency incentives, if one of the five criteria are not met no award will be given; $200 for the employee evaluation — there are 10 criteria and if the employee fails four it is deemed a failed evaluation and $400 for employee goal awards. There was an additional $200 physical fitness incentive that Guest said should probably not be part of merit pay.
Ruben said the two sides should try negotiating merit pay in the new contract that will be negotiated for 2016-2018. The supervisors and sheriff’s deputies both had wage reopeners in their contracts after they agreed to a $500 lump sum payment for 2013. The conciliator in the deputies’ contract dispute awarded a 2.5 percent pay hike for 2014 and another 2.5 percent for this year on Jan. 26, which will cost the county about $550,000.
Union President Sgt. Jeff Gebhart noted Ruben pointed out their salaries have been eroded by inflation and mounting health insurance costs and said that is why they will not agree to pay-for-performance. He believes the commissioners offered a juicy deal, including adding to base pay this time, to get them locked into merit pay so they could freeze base pay in the future.
“Their offer came up considerably when we reopened, they quadrupled it, they even added to our base and it was to entice us to go to pay-for-performance, it was basically a trap,” he said. “If we would have gone for pay-for-performance and it was language in our contract, it would have been very difficult at best to ever an increase in the base wages.”
County Administrator Charlie Young pointed out the base pay increase was part of the offer they put on the table. He said the conciliators in both union contracts have failed to recognize what is important here.
“We find most of this to be unbelievable,” he said. “The linkage to the consumer price index, when it should be linked to the wages of the taxpayers, those are the ones that are providing the money for government to operate. Their pay has not been keeping pace with the CPI. That’s all you read about in the conciliation reports is this concern about the consumer price index, what about the concern for the taxpayer.”
Chief Tony Dwyer said the sheriff’s office could appeal the two decisions to the common pleas court, but they don’t plan on making that move.
“The award is there and we’ll probably move forward with implementing it as dictated by the conciliator and move on,” he said.
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