Council considers cuts, raises [Portsmouth Daily Times, Ohio]

Jan. 08--Sixth Ward Councilman Steve Sturgill was frustrated by 9:45 a.m. Saturday during Saturday's City Council budget hearings.

"We have spent 45 minutes talking about giving raises and hiring new people, and we're here to try to figure out how to cut the budget," the newly elected Sturgill told Council.

Sturgill was referring to two Portsmouth Municipal Court judges' reference that the city's non-union employees are far behind the city's union workers when it comes to pay, especially in light of a plan to ask all workers to pay more of their health insurance benefits.

Judge Russell D. Kegley has asked for an additional $24,000 to bring the court's 15 non-union employees up to the six percent increase union workers got at the beginning of 2011.

Mayor David Malone said that in addition to the 15 non-union workers in the Municipal Court, 26 other city employees are also non-union, and they traditionally were given the same raises as union workers, yet that has not been done in recent years.

"The unions are being protected while their non-union counterparts are, quite honestly, being screwed because of budget cuts," First Ward Councilman Kevin Johnson said. "We can't afford to continue doing that. If we don't take care of our non-union employees and raise their salaries at the same time we're hitting them with increased cost compared to what they're paying now -- that's significant to them."

Following discussion, Council chose not to authorize the raises for non-union workers proposed by the judges, but also recommended non-union workers not have to pay the proposed increased premium that will be put before the union employees. That increase would have to be approved by the union employees before it could take effect.

Filling in for Police Chief Charles Horner who is on medical leave, Capt. Rob Ware also presented his budget, reminding Council his department is projected to run about seven people short in the next couple months. Ware said Council could cut $220,000 because he said it would take months before the hiring process could be completed, which means that money will most likely not be needed until all seven are hired. However, he asked, and Portsmouth City Council complied, that $20,000 be put back into the department's overtime account.

"We have a manpower shortage, which we already had in 2011 that Council and the mayor elected not to bring us up to the full table of organization," Ware said after the meeting. "The hiring of the Shawnee State officers, and with the pending retirement of the chief, that deficit is now going to go to seven. The hiring process is lengthy -- the training process is lengthy -- so the time it takes to do the pre-employment process of a respective employee; elect to hire them; give them the training they need; by the time you get them on the payroll you're recognizing that a quarter to six months out of the year they are not on the payroll."

Johnson has proposed that six positions, three in police and three in fire, be delayed in the hiring process, which he said would result in a savings in 2012-2013 of $525,000. Ware said he didn't believe the city could purposely delay the hiring because it would be in breech of the City Charter, which mandates 44 employees in each department.

Council is mandated by the State of Ohio, since being placed on fiscal caution status, to come up with a plan to cut its deficit of more than $1 million. At the same time the city recently received an income tax increase, bringing the city income tax to two percent, but they do not expect to see the results of that increase before the end of the year.

Frank Lewis may be reached at 740-353-3101, ext. 232, or at [email protected].

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