Agenda Packets - 2008/04/07 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Item No: 7 Meeting Date: April 7, 2008 Type of Business: Worksession Administrator Review : ___ City of Mounds View Staff Report To: Honorable Mayor and City Council From: James Ericson, Clerk - Administrator Item Title/Subject: Compensation Study Discussion Introduction: The City Council asked to begin discussion regarding the preparation of a new compensation study consistent with Section 3.01 of the Personnel Manual. Background: In April of 2006, the City authorized Laumeyer and Associates to conduct a compensation study and pay equity analysis. Rather than using the Stanton Six communities for the study consistent with the Personnel Manual, the City identified ten alternative communities--Arden Hills, Monticello, Robbinsdale, Buffalo, Mound, St. Michael, Hutchinson, North St Paul, Vadnais Heights and Little Canada. Laumeyer prepared its compensation study which was presented to the City Council on July 10, 2006. There were many questions raised at the Council meeting in response to the study and ultimately the Council adopted a resolution simply acknowledging receipt of the study rather than accepting or approving it. There were many questions raised by employees as well, who felt the study was flawed in multiple respects. The two primary concerns raised by staff included the fact that the chosen cities were not at all comparable and the purported “market rate” bore no relationship to actual salaries. Using the Laumeyer data, it was later revealed via an “apples to apples” comparison that Mounds View salaries were about 6% LESS than the average comparable cities wages. Discussion: Many positions have not experienced a market rate adjustment since 1998. This issue has been brought to the attention of previous administrators and previous Councils, however with the exception of the Laumeyer study which was ultimately not accepted, no action has been taken to address the gap between Mounds View wages and those of comparable cities. This fact has been documented in correspondence from the city’s previous finance director in 2005 and a memo from Chief Sommer in 2004. Last month I prepared a comprehensive compensation memo which compared wages for non-union personnel with three different data sets--the Laumeyer cities, Stanton Group Six and a modified Stanton Group Six, which included metro cities with populations between 9,000 and 19,999 having their own police force. In each of the three comparisons, non- union wages were less than their comparative municipal counterparts.