League City City Council on Sept. 27 granted raises to 347 employees at a cost of over $1.13 million. The move was based on recommendations from Evergreen Solutions, a consultant the city hired to assess the pay of League City employees compared to that of peer cities, including Pasadena, Baytown, Sugar Land and others.
The $1.13 million cost includes Evergreen’s recommendations and up to 5% in merit-based increases. Typically, League City employees earn merit increases of up to 4% at the start of each year, but for 2023, it is 5%, city officials said.
As part of the change, the city’s minimum wage increased from $12.50 to $15 an hour, affecting a handful of pay grades.
“That’s pretty significant,” City Manager John Baumgartner said.
According to study documents provided by the city, Evergreen found the midpoint pay of several city jobs were below the average of peer cities.
At the midpoint pay, League City civil engineers earn $76,016 compared to the peer average of $106,417. The human resources director earns $122,384 at the midpoint pay compared to the peer average of $141,348. An accounting technician makes $44,355 at the midpoint pay compared to the peer average of $48,644, according to the documents.
“I felt we were a little behind the market, and that’s what the study showed,” Baumgartner said.
Despite many staff jobs seeing raises from the compensation study starting in January, some will not, Budget and Project Management Director Angie Steelman said.
“Not everyone got something from the market survey,” she said.
However, other positions will receive merit salary increases based on employee evaluations.
EMS, telecommunication raises
For EMS employees and telecommunicators, or 911 dispatchers, City Council went beyond Evergreen’s recommendation, granting further raises of $3 per hour in lieu of the 5% merit increase. This resulted in a net gain for most employees’ pay, all at an additional cost of $115,000.
Baumgartner asked the departments to find a total of $115,000 worth of expenses to scrub from their budgets to afford the additional raises. If they cannot, city staff may reduce expenses from other parts of the budget to afford the raises, he said.
EMS employees and telecommunicators were a bit further behind the market than other League City positions. Depending where they are in the paygrade, these employees are getting about a 20% raise in total, Baumgartner said.
“They were probably the furthest behind of the group, and they got the biggest adjustment,” he said.
Over the summer, the city saw significant turnover in EMS and telecommunications employees. City staff cited numerous factors for this, including the stress of the job and rising inflation.
It is due to this turnover League City City Council granted additional raises to EMS and telecommunications workers.
“I don’t think we can afford to lose anymore EMS [workers], and I don’t think we can afford to lose anymore telecommunicators,” Mayor Pat Hallisey said at the Sept. 27 meeting, before his retirement.
Most other council members agreed, though there was some debate at the dais.
“The fact is we ask our staff to do more with less, and we’ve done that for a long time with our telecommunicators and our EMS,” Council Member Chad Tressler said.
City staff “absolutely” believes the incoming raises will slow turnover down in these departments, Baumgartner said.
League City had not done a similar study of employees’ pay since at least 2017. Ideally, the city would do such studies every three years to make sure employees are being paid competitively, Baumgartner said.
“At some point, we said, ‘No, we need to do something,’” he said.
