Government : Benton County Compensation Board meets, and then schedules a redo

The Benton County Compensation Board met on January 5th to determine the wages for elected officials in the upcoming fiscal year beginning in July 2023. The board will be meeting again tonight for a redo meeting. See the new agenda HERE.

According to the county's website, the Compensation Board is made up of the following members:

Janay Bendull, representing the Treasurer

Anders Norgaard representing the Sheriff

Michele Schoonover,  representing the Auditor

Nick Volk representing the Supervisors

John Yundt representing the Recorder

These board members have terms which expire on June 30, 2023. 

Terry Harrington represents the County Attorney

Karen Mouchka represents the Supervisors

These board members have terms which expire on June 30 of 2025.

However, that wasn't the board that attended the meeting. 

Representing the Supervisors was Jennifer Zahradnik and representing the County Attorney was Mike Kirkpatrick.  

The board made recommendations for the 2024 Fiscal Year salaries of the Elected County Officials.

Yundt called the meeting to order. Zahradnik asked each department head to share what their office's duties were in each of their jobs. She then gave an explanation of how motions would be made. She felt that a dollar amount would be fairer rather than a percentage amount and made motions based on this plan. 

There was talk about the rate of inflation and how it's at 8% and that seemed to matter for only some of the decisions made.

Robert's Rule of Order also came up in discussion. The rules had not been followed during all of the meeting.  (this is discussed below)

The proposed salary increases for the elected officials came in as follows:

Auditor

8.2% or .$7,000

Treasurer 

7.1% or $6,500

Recorder

7.1% or $6.500

Sheriff

7.33% $8,000

Supervisor

roughly 5% or $2,500

Chairman $5,000

County Attorney

2.75% or $3,500 

The above is just the facts. There really should be a section called, Newsetorial: news with my opinion at the end.

In my opinion, I had several issues with this meeting. Before I could finish this story a redo meeting was scheduled, so my thoughts must not have been too far off. 

Let's start with the "board" in attendance. Two attendees, Zahradnik and Kirkpatric were not appointed to the board, yet came as board members,  I'm unsure how this officially works in government.

Zahradnik asked the officials to explain their duties  

a) this meeting is supposed to be amongst the board, not the elected officials

b) as a result of this question, were salaries based on the spiel made by the officials?

When it came time for the County Attorney's salary to be discussed, it was determined that since he had only been on the job for five days, he didn't deserve the same pay raise as the other officials. 

First, the length of time in the office wasn't taken into account for the other offices. The wages will kick in 7 months into the county attorney's term. Should he then be awarded more had the meeting been held in June rather than January?

Secondly, the decisions are made about the office being held, not the length of time the official has held the office, not their duties, no other factors. If this is the case I think we might need some graphs to determine the worth of the official. 

Thirdly, Robert's Rule of Order was not followed in this decision. A motion was made, a second received and the vote was taken. In the appropriate order, there should have been a motion, a second a DISCUSSION and then a vote taken. The representative for the county attorney had no opportunity to make his case to the other members of the board. 

Remember, the supervisors can't adjust these amounts except to lower the rates. But if they lower anyone's raise, they have to lower them all equally.

Overall, this meeting was not a good move on the part of the board. Suggestions for the board might be to 1) allow newly elected officials time to select their representatives, have them appropriately appointed, and go from there.   2) Stick with across-the-board type raises, they are fairer to everyone. The numbers this year appear to be a slap in the face to some and arbitrary for everyone else.

Like the kids would say IMO.