Personnel/Administrative Affairs Committee

PERSONNEL/ADMINISTRATIVE AFFAIRS COMMITTEE APRIL 21, 2014 A meeting of the Personnel/Administrative Affairs Committee was held on Monday, April 21, 2014, at 7:00 p.m. in the Aldermanic Chamber. Acting Chairman June M. Caron, presided. Members of the Committee present: Alderman Paul M. Chasse, Jr. Alderman Sean McGuinness Alderman Ken Siegel Alderman Michael Soucy Also in Attendance: Mayor Donnalee Lozeau Alderman-at-Large Jim Donchess Alderman David Schoneman Alderman-at-Large David W. Deane Alderman-at-Large Diane Sheehan Barbara Hill, Director of Human Resources John Griffin, CFO PUBLIC COMMENT - None INTERVIEWS Director of Division of Community Development Sarah Marchant (New Appointment) Indefinite Term at the Pleasure of the Mayor Mayor Lozeau It is my pleasure to be here tonight and introduce the choice of myself and our interview team for our new Community Development Director, Sarah Marchant. I know that you all have received her resume and her bio. As many of you know, Director Hersh left in July and it has been a very long search to find not only the candidate that had the right skills but one that I thought would be a really good fit with the staff, the city, and the other directors. We set up two interview teams and we ended up with five finalists and then narrowed it down to three. The first interview team was comprised of Alderman McCarthy, and also the former Community Development Director, Kathy Hersh, and myself. The second team was comprised of Director Galligani, Director Fauteux, and Alderman Chasse because I thought it would be helpful to have the committee chairman join us. We were unanimous in that the person sitting here tonight brought the biggest breadth of experience, knowing the area, the work she has done in Amherst, her skill with GIS, her ability to working with planning and zoning, as well as other things. You’ll see from her resume and some of the committees that she has served on that she is well regarded by her peers. She has been chosen by them to chair different committees and groups on a statewide level and so I think that you will enjoy hearing from Sarah tonight and I would hope that the committee will support this choice. Sarah Marchant Thank you for having me, it’s a great opportunity. You already have my resume and a lot of basic background information about me. I would be more than happy to answer any questions that you have tonight. I am very much looking forward to this opportunity and some of the challenges that I am sure would be before me walking in the door here. I am here to be part of this team and I look forward to it. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 2 Alderman Chasse You were one of my picks for the position and I think that your resume speaks for itself and the way you handled yourself at the interview was very impressive and I thought it was a very strong point. Alderman Siegel I really don’t feel that I have any questions to ask because honestly, I think that given the number of people that you have spoken to and the likely detailed vetting process, I am quite sure that a good choice was made. I am very happy that you selected Nashua because of course, you also have options; you could go somewhere else also so thank you very much for choosing our city. Alderman Deane Are you familiar with the city? Sarah Marchant Yes. Alderman Deane What do you see us lacking in this area of community development? Sarah Marchant I think one of the things I bring to the table as a planner is that I don’t come to the table with an agenda; I don’t come with a plan laid out. I think one of the beautiful things about being a planner is that it is my job to listen to the issues, to come in and evaluate what is going on, to hear what everybody has to say and facilitate those communications to then come back to you for ideas and solutions to then be implemented. I don’t have a laundry list to come in with things that I see that need to be fixed or changed immediately. I need to come in here and see the lay of the land first. Alderman Deane I wouldn’t expect you to come in and be critical of what currently exists. It’s an interesting position. Kathy Hersh did a lot of different things in her time here, some of them I agreed with and some of them I didn’t agree with but agreed with it after it was done. She had a lot of vision and a lot of different projects. When we built the senior activity center and we took that section of Temple Street that had a dilapidated senior activity center building and another structure that was owned by Mr. Tomalonis and we ended up being able to do some negotiating and ended up putting in senior housing attached to our senior activity center which was a benefit for the community. The seniors got the housing and we got the activity center. We had a few environmental issues over there which Kathy was pretty well educated in that area. What is your background with dealing with asbestos because we have that stuff everywhere? Sarah Marchant I went through a brief training course as part of – I do code enforcement right now as part of my background. I have been to a half-day program on the basic enforcement of it. I have a basic understanding of what it is and what the laws say and I look forward to working with code enforcement and building to ensure that they are making sure that that’s what gets done. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 3 Alderman Deane Your current position in Amherst is Community Development Director, correct? Sarah Marchant Correct. Alderman Deane How many individuals work underneath you or answer to you? Sarah Marchant Five. Alderman Deane If you are appointed to this position, how many individuals will be working under you? Sarah Marchant Directly under me would be five managers with their own departments which consist of a considerable number of people. Alderman Deane Have you met the five managers? Sarah Marchant I have. I had the opportunity to have lunch with them. Alderman Deane How did that go? Sarah Marchant Very well, I think. Mayor Lozeau Alderman Deane, she’s had four interviews plus an opportunity to meet with the staff in a more casual setting. Alderman Deane I wasn’t involved in the interviews. So your goals and objectives for the community are what? Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 4 Sarah Marchant Like I said, I don’t have them outlined yet. I think one of the really important parts of somebody coming into this job is to listen to the community, to find out where there are holes and where there are things that we are doing really good and make sure that all of those line up to ensure that we can continue to do those things that work and that we focus attention and energy on things that need improvement. I know that not all of the action items in the master plan have been completed. There are some great new studies that have been done. The recent Tree Streets Plan, the expansion of the Broad Street Parkway, so there are a lot of identified action items out there that have not yet been completed. Those might be the low hanging fruit to start with or there may be other outstanding issues that need focus on and it depends on what the community needs and what those priorities are identified as. Alderman Deane This board usually funds the priorities. Sarah Marchant That’s excellent. Alderman Deane Well, that’s the way our government works. The Mayor comes in with suggestions and recommendations for the budget process and then we other forms of revenue but we end up making the final decision on a lot of things. Thank you very much for taking the time to answer my questions. Sarah Marchant I look forward to working with you. Alderman McGuinness Ms. Marchant, it’s nice to have you. You have an interesting background, very professional and you are certainly well qualified. I had a constituent call me tonight, Rabbi Jon Spira-Savett. He is the chair of the Interfaith Council and he was just interested to know how you would work with some of the charitable organizations in the city. He had particularly mentioned the Tree Streets. I guess he had some concern about that. I don’t mean to put you on the spot. Sarah Marchant I think coming in, like I said, about listening. I think the Tree Street Plan has connections like that in it and talks about some of the people who gave a lot input and time into that and reconnecting with those people would be essential. This is not really related but I am finalizing a complete revision to the septic regulations and we didn’t do that by just talking to some consultant and say what’s changed since 1973. We went out first to our frequent flyers, our developers and installers and asked what do you need? What do you see that’s working and not working? Did we take everything on their laundry list, no but by getting their buy in, it’s made the process much more smooth and everyone is getting what they need out of the end process. Absolutely, I would be more than happy to work with them. I plan to reach out to as many community groups and activists as I can. They are the connection to those parts of the community and that would be a very big part of what I do. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 5 Alderman Donchess This is not an easy position to fill and I think Ms. Marchant is a really good choice and one from the region which is also a good thing. I’m not on the committee but I would be happy to support her appointment. I guess the only thing that I would ask is after Ms. Marchant is on the job for a while and gets a sense of where she wants to direct her department and the city, that she would come back to the Board of Alderman to discuss her priorities. Alderman Sheehan You have very big shoes to fill because we did have a very vision focused predecessor before you. As I am looking at your background, I see that it has a lot of professional affiliations. One of the things I am noting is that it is in a town background and although part of Nashua looks a little like Amherst or Milford, most of it looks very different so we have very different concerns so I am wondering what you are going to draw on to be able to look at what opportunities are there and enhance walk ability? Additionally, do you have any background in grant writing? Sarah Marchant I do have a background in grant writing. I have secured over $40,000 in grants in the last two years for Amherst to complete projects that needed to be done. As far as walk ability, as President of the Planner’s Association I have an amazing network of people who I can tap into at any point in time and I definitely plan to. I agree that Nashua is not a town and that there will be a significant change in scale but I think I am looking forward to that challenge. Also, what I don’t think is listed in there is that I have been certified in form based codes and have been to trainings all over New England on those and I think the whole idea of walk ability in public space and addressing that first is the heart of form based codes. I think there is a lot of opportunity to look at something like that for Nashua in the downtown area and in a lot of areas. Acting Chairman Caron I’d like to say welcome aboard. If you get this position I think it’s wonderful that you are looking to go from a small community to a large city. I also think that your willingness to step off and run but not come in with major ideas before you have a chance to talk to everyone, whether it’s the Board of Alderman or other group leaders within the city, I think is a great way to do it. I agree with Alderman Donchess, I would think in six months time or something you might have some information and I’m sure the Mayor would allow you to come back to us and give us some ideas of what you are looking for. As Alderman Deane says, we hold the money bag and we would certainly want to support you if you come in with some great ideas. On behalf of the committee hopefully, you’ll be appointed today and with us soon. COMMUNICATIONS From: Mayor Donnalee Lozeau Re: Community Development Director MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO ACCEPT AND PLACE ON FILE MOTION CARRIED APPLICATION TO LICENSE HAWKER'S, PEDDLER'S, ITINERANT VENDOR'S LICENSE – None Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 6 APPOINTMENTS BY THE MAYOR Director of Division of Community Development Sarah Marchant (New Appointment) Indefinite Term at the Pleasure of the Mayor 19 Milford Street Brookline, NH 03033 MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO RECOMMEND THE CONFIRMATION OF THE APPOINTMENT OF SARAH MARCHANT TO THE OFFICE OF DIRECTOR OF DIVISION OF COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT MOTION CARRIED UNFINISHED BUSINESS – RESOLUTIONS – None UNFINISHED BUSINESS – ORDINANCES Amended, O-14-014 Endorser: Alderman Paul M. Chasse, Jr. REGARDING REAPPOINTMENT PROCEDURES  Amended at Full Board – 3/25 and Referred to Personnel, PEDC, NCPB & ZBA  PEDC Recommended Final Passage – 4/15/14  NCPB Issued Favorable Recommendation - 4/10/14  ZBA Issued Favorable Recommendation - 4/8/14 MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCYTO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE AS AMENDED MOTION CARRIED NEW BUSINESS – RESOLUTIONS R-14-013 Endorsers: Alderman-at-Large Brian S. McCarthy Alderwoman Mary Ann Melizzi-Golja Alderwoman Pamela T. Brown DECLARING MAY SCULPTURES MONTH MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCYTO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE MOTION CARRIED NEW BUSINESS – ORDINANCES O-14-017 Endorser: Mayor Donnalee Lozeau ADOPTION OF AMENDMENTS TO MERIT EMPLOYEE RULES AND REGULATIONS EFFECTIVE JULY 1, 2014 MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCYTO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 7 ON THE QUESTION Mayor Lozeau This evening Director of Human Resources, Barbara Hill and John Griffin, CFO, are joining me tonight to walk through the changes to the merit plan. It’s good policy to take a look at the plan every few years and make changes as appropriate and/or necessary. The majority of the changes tonight are a little bit of housekeeping. Director Hill is going to walk you through the changes and then when we get to the actual grid, the CFO will walk you through that and I believe the Director has a summary sheet that we can pass out. It’s similar to what we do when there is a contract and there are changes. If there are other questions about the merit plan that aren’t things that have changed, we are happy to answer those as well. I would like to let you know the process we used for this. The ordinance wants to make sure that division directors’ and department heads have a chance to look at the proposed changes prior to them being brought to the Board of Alderman. That happened, it actually happened twice and we worked on this as a complete cabinet so that included all of the divisions plus the police department, the fire department, school and the library. Director Hill The first change is under Work Schedule – We have added language to define a standard work schedule as 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. and require approval for variations from the standard schedule. The second change is under Attendance – We have the new Kronos Time and Attendance System. One of the concerns is something called “buddy punching” which is when employees punch one another in either on the clock or time stamping in a computer. This is to clarify the fact that that is strictly prohibited and progressive discipline will be applied to anyone caught punching or time stamping for another employee. Alderman Siegel I am concerned about using the phrase “buddy punching.” We might have different interpretations of what that might be and I think it would be better for legislative purposes if it was explicitly spelled out exactly what you said rather than calling it “buddy punching” because “buddy punching” could literally mean punching my buddy. I don’t like legislation with colloquialisms in them. Director Hill Okay, so if we said time stamping at a clock or on a computer for another employee is strictly prohibited and may subject both employees to progressive discipline up to and including termination of employment with a recommendation that we take the colloquialism out of “buddy punching.” Alderman Siegel Yes, instead of calling it “buddy punching,” you had a definition, which as you were saying it, I thought it seemed to be appropriate. Mayor Lozeau It’s in there. We will just take out “buddy punching.” The whole definition was in there, it just started with the term in quotations. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 8 Alderman Siegel Okay, it looks like something separate. Alderman Chasse In the payroll world, “buddy punching” is a standard phrase whether it has time clocks or Kronos, “buddy punching” is a defined expression. Alderman Siegel I am not changing my opinion of my comment whether “buddy punching” is appropriate for legislation. It might be a well-known colloquialism in use payroll but it doesn’t seem like it adds anything. If we can just eliminate it and have the same affect, why not get rid of it? MOTION BY ALDERMAN SIEGEL TO AMEND TO ELIMININATE “BUDDY PUNCHING” AND THE COMMA FOLLOWING IT, INITIAL CAPITALIZE THE WORD “TIME” AND RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE AS AMENDED MOTION CARRIED Director Hill The next section with a change is under Personnel File and this is a housekeeping matter. We created a form a while back requiring people who are reviewing an employee’s file to sign a form acknowledging that they are reviewing the personnel file. Obviously, it requires the authority of the employee if it’s from someone from outside but we like to keep a record of who’s been in the files and who’s seen what. We do not allow the files to leave the department. We just wanted to add the fact that there is a form. Acting Chairman Caron We’ve never had that form before? Director Hill No. Alderman Chasse I’m kind of confused on that one. Who has the authority to review a file? Director Hill A supervisor can review a file for someone who reports to them. Alderman Chasse The immediate supervisor? Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 9 Director Hill Correct and if the employee authorizes it through their signature, they can allow a union member to review their file but they would have to give permission for that. We would not let their union representation review the file without the employee’s permission and they would have to sign for it. Alderman Chasse How about a request for a file from an employee? Director Hill We do have a form for that and it would acknowledge that they received a full copy of the file as of that date. Alderman Chasse I have never heard of a union member looking at somebody else’s file. Director Hill We do have that happen. Alderman Chasse Wow. Director Hill The next is under Exit Interviews – Although this has been the practice for a while that we require employees to return city property when they separate from employment, we wanted to make it clear that all city property must be returned and the exit interview is the appropriate time to do that. Again, this is clarifying a procedure that we have had for quite a while and we want to make sure that the employees anticipate it. Alderman Siegel I do appreciate that the city property should be returned no later than at or earlier than the interview. I would like it clarified that the property can be returned either earlier than or at the interview. If it’s city property you don’t want to tell them they can return it at the interview. God knows what that property might be. Director Hill The only concern I want to alert you to is the fact that the HR Department actually maintains a list of all of the city property that is taken out by individual employees and our preference is to have it returned at the exit interview so that we can determine that all the pieces have been returned. I understand what you are saying and we could change that language but we would have to verify with whoever it was returned to earlier to make sure that we hadn’t missed any pieces of it. Alderman Siegel Based on what you are telling me now, it sounds like it would be more complicated than is reasonable so I withdraw my request. Thank you for the clarification. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 10 Mayor Lozeau Alderman Siegel, the reason that we didn’t do exactly what you described is because we did have a problem with someone that said “well, I gave this to that one and this part to that one.” Alderman Siegel Understood, thank you, that makes sense. Director Hill The next is the Merit Pay Program - We currently have language that says when an employee reaches the last step on the merit pay grid, the language currently says “shall be eligible for a salary increase equal to the three year average of the CPI-U Northeast.” We would like to change that language back to language that says “shall be eligible for an annual lump sum payment equal to the three year average of the CPI-U Northeast.” Again, this changes this to a single payment in place of an increase which compounds yearly. Alderman Siegel I like the change a lot but I have a question. Is there an effect on the pensions from the lump sum payments? I know salaries obviously factor into pensions but do lump sum payments or not? Mr. Griffin The lump sum payment would factor in. Alderman Siegel So there’s no change, it’s just a question of the compounding? Mr. Griffin That’s correct. Alderman Deane Mr. Griffin, did you do cost avoidance analysis for this language change? Mr. Griffin I have not. Alderman Deane So we don’t know what it is? Mayor Lozeau I don’t think that we calculated it. What we were trying to achieve was that it had been this way and then nobody knew when it changed to be something that was compounded and when it came to our attention, we wanted to make it clear. Some of us felt very strongly that it should not be something that compounds. If your Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 11 question Alderman Deane is how many people are currently off the grid, we can talk a little bit more to that when we get to the grid because we believe that the changes that are being proposed tonight will put everybody back on the grid so this probably won’t be something that we have to address any time soon again. Alderman Deane I was thinking back to 2010 when we brought this legislation in for the review process. Did you see that Director Hill? Director Hill I actually wasn’t here yet. Alderman Deane The legislation provided that the merit system may from time to time be amended or changed by proposed ordinances to the merit plan document resulting from this legislation shall be submitted for approval through a subsequent ordinance. What this did was it changed the timeline on the review process and in fact, I sponsored this with you Mayor and you didn’t even sign it and it was approved. What gives? I think I talked to you about this because we had a lot of variations about people stepping off the grid and things like that and the whole merit plan hadn’t been looked at for a long time so we put a three year timeline on it. Do you think the timeline should be changed? Do you think three years is too long? It doesn’t have to be a thorough review but for every three years but there can be subsequent subtle changes to it during the year. If you do it Mayor, it’s got to be shown to the division director’s and department heads. If we do it through an ordinance, then it’s got to go through a group. Mayor Lozeau The CFO, HR, myself, and the Personnel Advisory Board. Alderman Deane Do you think that three years should be changed? Director Hill I think three years is a reasonable amount of time. I wouldn’t want it to go longer than that. Alderman Deane I was wondering if shorter would have been better. Director Hill The next section is on Payroll Deduction – The Payroll Department no longer offers a U.S. Savings Bond so we deleted that language and we are adding a short-term disability and Roth IRA as optional payroll deductions. Again, both are voluntary benefits and not at any cost to the city, it’s just an option for employees. Acting Chairman Caron You have the Roth; do you still have the Deferred Comp? Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 12 Director Hill Yes, that is still in there. That’s the 457 Plan is on the city side and 403 B and on the school side. We still offer those plans as well as our Defined Benefit Plan. Acting Chairman Caron It sounds like there wasn’t enough interest in the savings bonds? Director Hill That’s correct. There wasn’t enough interest in it so we have discontinued it. The next section is on Workers’ Compensation – Although this has been the long time practice, vacation and sick leave do accrue during workers’ compensation leaves and we had so many questions about it that we want to add it to the language so that people can readily get that without having to call a number of people to find out the answer. The next section is Personal Days – Merit employees do get personal days each year. We wanted to clarify that when an employee separates from employment whether it’s for retirement or any other type of separation, resignation, termination, etc., that personal days are not something that we pay out to them. Also, when someone is on a leave of absence, because we can’t be certain that they are going to return, we don’t award the personal days until they do return and then we give them to them. If you were out, for example, on a long term disability and it overlapped the July period where they would typically be awarded, we’re not going to give them to you. We’re going to wait until you return and then give you your award of personal days when you come back to work. The next is Family Medical Leave Act. There were some not so recent changes within the last several years on the federal side for the Family Medical Act which included some modifications especially in regard to military. We hadn’t updated our language, wanted to make sure that employees knew that there had been some improvements to the Family Medical Leave Act and not to try to explain it in this document but to direct them to that and to the actual Act for the information because it is rather involved who is eligible for it and under what conditions. The next piece is on our Health Insurance, my favorite part. This is our new high deductible play with HSA which is an additional plan that we are offering the city as well as the two HMOs and the Point-of-Service plan. We wanted to put that plan in the document as well since it’s an offering we started last year. The next piece also relates to benefits. There was a piece in there about something that the document calls the “birthday rule” which said that if employees are married and both work for the city, whoever’s birthday occurs soonest in the year is responsible for the benefits. Because the city is self-funded there isn’t any true logic or savings or benefit that I could discern to forcing one spouse as opposed to the other to be the person to enroll in the benefits. I’m recommending that we strike the language about the birthday rule. Alderman Siegel Nothing about the birthday rule, don’t get nervous; just a clerical question. There’s a phrase just about that. It says: “City contribution effective October 1, 2011.” Is that intentional, October 1, 2011 because that’s when it became effective? Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 13 Mayor Lozeau That’s when we made the changes. Alderman Siegel Okay, thank you. That’s what I thought. Mayor Lozeau That’s the retro that we talk about all the time. Director Hill So no one has a problem with the birthday rule going away? Thank you. I personally appreciate that. Acting Chairman Caron I would have, but it’s too late. Please continue. Director Hill The next is the dental insurance. Again this is somewhat housekeeping. We are trying to add to our benefits some voluntary benefits which have no cost to the city except some administration but provide additional benefits for employees. One of these is a dental buy-up plan where employees can purchase a higher level or a higher value dental plan. It’s entirely at their expense. We wanted tor record it here to let them know that there was more than the basic dental option. The next two are long term and short term disability. Long term disability again is a self-funded plan with the city and this is to make the merit document match our long term disability policy which does not offer long term disability to our part-time employees. The prior merit document offered it to anyone who worked more than 20 hours per week. We’re recommending that we match the actual policy and say that it is for our full-time employees. Short term disability is a whole new concept. The Department of Public Works has been offering it to our merit employees for awhile. It was a Department of Public Works plan, and we would like to be able to offer it to more employees. Again as a voluntary benefit and we’d like to put in the merit document that this will be offered to them at their expense. The next group is the merit sick leave bank. Again a longstanding program we’ve had since 2004, but have failed to mention before now. It’s for our merit employees to be able to buy into a sick bank in case there’s a catastrophic illness where they might not have time on the books to help them get through. This again just records the fact that particular benefit is in existence. Following that is flexible spending account. The federal government has set the limit at $2500 as the maximum an individual can put in their flex spending account. We would like to amend the document to match that federal cap and also take not of the fact for employees that it is against federal law to have both a HSA and a flex spending account at the same time in a family. It was one of those “gotcha’s” that we wanted to make sure that employees were aware of. It’s not just an individual can’t have both, it’s a family that can’t have both or else the IRS will be looking for you. The next is on the retirement system. Everyone in this room I’m sure is well aware the New Hampshire Retirement System can change the percentage that the employer or the employee contributes. They review it Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 14 once every two years. We had produced the last merit document just before NHRS had set their rate at 7 percent for the employee contribution. Wanted to take note of that change but also wanted to alert employees to the fact that it was up for review by the state and it was something that the state controls. They tell us how much we’re going to pay on their behalf and how much they are going to pay. The language reflects both the current rate and the fact that it is under review every other year. Finally, Mr. Griffin will try to explain our proposed merit salary grid. Mayor Lozeau I handed out a document that looks like this at the Board of Aldermen meeting the night that this legislation was introduced so people could have one that they could potentially read. I have two more copies here tonight if somebody needs an additional copy. Director Hill I brought five additional. Mayor Lozeau So we have seven. Enough for everybody if somebody wants one. Mr. Griffin The merit grid was changed to eliminate the first three steps and add five steps to the back end of the grid. If we had not recommended that change, we currently have 12 employees that are off grid. They earn more than the highest step in their grade. As of July 1, 2014, we’d have another 12 employees that are off the grid. We tried to accomplish two things simultaneously. One was as we discussed earlier, to the extent an employee is off the grid there would be a lump sum payment that’s considered earnings so it’s taxable, it’s pensionable, etc. This will provide the 12 employees that are currently off the grid as well as the 12 employees that would be off the grid a landing spot on the grid. As far as the design of the additional five steps, there was a standard 2.9 percent increase applied to those steps. Alderman Deane Where did the 2.9 percent come from? Mr. Griffin The 2.9 % was as Mayor Lozeau indicated; there was a group of individuals that reviewed this particular plan. Those individuals essentially settled on a 2.9 percent recommendation. Mayor Lozeau Mr. Griffin, correct me if I’m wrong, the merit grid prior to the $750 addition for health care that happened in 2007 or 2008, just as I was coming in, it used to be the grid in the first part of the grid had an increase of greater than 3 percent and that the second half had one just below 3 percent or just at 3 percent. What we wanted to do was we wanted to make sure we didn’t exceed 3 percent, but we followed the same pattern that had been there for the steps prior to the changes. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 15 Mr. Griffin That’s correct. Mayor Lozeau The current grid is at three percent so we went with 2.9. Mr. Griffin Right. Just to provide a little bit more clarity, this particular grid design is based on the Hay system. Director Hill can probably speak to that more eloquently than I can, but my understanding of a Hay system is if you have a grid that has multiple grades, multiple steps at or near the mid-point of the steps that’s when, as Mayor Lozeau indicated, it would basically level set at a three percent increase. When the city introduced the $750 amount that was actually added to all of the steps on the grid to keep that $750 embedded it changed the percentages. Whenever you add a certain nominal amount to a grid and then divide the increase by the previous amount, you end up with 2.97, 2.96. In the earlier steps it was 3.6 instead of 3.7, those types of mechanics. When we discussed this item during the Fiscal 14 budget deliberations, we actually had a before and after view of here’s what the grid looked like before, here’s what it looked like after that $750 was applied. With regard to the percentage increases, when we took out the first three steps we didn’t add the 3.7 to the new steps, 7-9. You’re going to see the percentages are more in line with three percent. Then they would get up and the final 5 steps would be 2.9 percent across the board no matter what grade you’re at. The last 5 steps are at 2.9 increases. Alderman Siegel I understand why you mechanically tweaked this to account for the $750. That’s clearer to me, the math is okay. It’s the 2.9 percent and apparently some body, people decided 2.9 percent is the right amount. I don’t know where that came from because of course we have budgetary caps. That’s higher than what we’re supposed to be capping our budget at. It might be a lack of education on my part but perhaps you can address that, where the 2.9 percent came from. Mayor Lozeau It was to mimic as close to the grid through the Hay System as we had had in place since we put a grid in for the merit system. If I could start everything over at a blank page, I’m not a big fan of steps and grids. I like performance based increases. We now have 16 unions in the city. Quite a few of them have a system like this. With some we’ve been successful in changing it completely, with others we have not. They all have a different view of what that looks like. If I thought we could change everything to say that no steps would be greater than the CPI-U that we set our budget with and anything above that would've be performance based or something like that, I would be more than willing to look at that. That’s not what we have in place. We’re in negotiations with some of our other unions right now, one of whose grid is really odd. It goes from 1.5 in some of their early grades all the way up to some over 3 percent in some of the later steps. Although that doesn’t answer the question as far as why would we have one, I guess one could argue: why we would have something at 2.9 if we don’t have a CPI-U that’s 2.9. I can’t answer that. Based on this being the Hay system, staying below that 3 percent and trying to average everything out, this was the best that we could come up with following those guidelines. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 16 Alderman Siegel I appreciate that; I’m just trying to see what was the constraint in the 2.9. Are we constrained contractually? This is hypothetically, but suppose you said, I know it’s at 2.9 percent but realistically times being what they are, why don’t we say 2.3 percent? Just to throw a number out there, just arbitrarily, and make the grid balance out for 2.3 percent. Mayor Lozeau Mr. Griffin is going to explain how you can’t seat them on the grid. Mr. Griffin If we just focus on the five that we added, we can pick any percentage. We can pick zero percent. We can pick 2.9 or something different. Just to hammer home the Mayor’s point, if we try to change anything to the left of the first 15 steps, it just does a number of trying to place people on the grid. The point of a 2.9, a couple of constraints we had. We wanted it less than 3 percent. That seems to be the will of the small committee that we had. We wanted to have it higher, and this is my recollection; I haven’t looked at the numbers, but probably the 40-year average of inflation plus a certain amount for what I would call a non-union group of employees. At one end we had the constraint of the 3 percent, making sure it was less than that and then based on our current view of negotiations which seemed to be hovering between 2.5 and 3 percent at this point, that’s where the recommendation came in. Alderman Siegel Once again it seems to me that if the difficulty is making more rows and columns that’s possible to keep people on a grid. But the 2.9 percent, I’m sorry, I just can’t get passed that versus say 2.5 which really is a number we have to think about. That’s a hard number that we all have to think about eventually. So yet we’re presented with a grid and it sounds to me, now I might be misinterpreting it, Mayor, perhaps you can correct me and I’m sure you’d be eager to do that, but there’s a few people that have dropped off this grid for one reason for another. We sort of rid out of slots for them. So we kind of constructed a mechanism by which we could get everybody on the grid and somehow 2.9 percent came out because it’s less than 3. Okay, correct my tortured logic if it is thus. Mayor Lozeau Actually I’m never excited to correct anybody, Alderman Siegel. Alderman Siegel Even me? Mayor Lozeau Anybody really. What I’m interested in is just us all having the same understanding by which to make decisions. We have a small group of employees left in the city that are our non-union employees. When we looked at how many were off the current grid and step today and how many were due to come off it, we looked at adding steps on the back end. As Mr. Griffin pointed out, everything from 1 to 14 is the existing grid today. All that was added was Steps 15-20. We basically mimicked the average of what was already there at the other end. If people want to change that that’s perfectly fine. The effort is to try to keep people on the grid. We can keep it the way it is now and not have these additional steps and just do as we’ve proposed in the Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 17 document: give a lump sum at the end of every year. I just don’t know that that’s what I think might be best practice. I also don’t want to end up with people being significantly overpaid simply because they’ve been here for a long period of time. It’s tough. You also don’t want to give them a reason to become a union. Alderman Siegel Believe me, I’m sympathetic with that. Mayor Lozeau That happened before. Alderman Siegel I understand creating more slots to keep people on from falling off the edge here, but once again because it was a certain percent doesn’t mean it has to be ever thus. Mayor Lozeau I agree. Alderman Siegel I don’t know who made the decision, what the committee was and that’s my ignorance. I’m not criticizing. I just don’t know. But somehow 2.9 percent popped out as a magic number, and I don’t know where it came from. It’s higher than we would want to grant most raises in this time and place given the financial situation we find our city in I think. I could be wrong. Other people may not feel what I feel. Mayor Lozeau It’s just a balance that we thought was appropriate to strike between recognizing that they don’t have the same benefits as our union employees, looking at what those grids are for those unions and looking at where they might sit on the grid here. That was just the balance that we thought made sense. Mr. Griffin could potentially add to that, but when you look at it, most employees are not necessarily hired in low on the grid. It depends on where they may fall. You want to give employees room to grow. Knowing that at the start of the grid, they were moving at an accelerated base and at the end of the grid, they slowed down some, we struck a balance. Most of the union contracts in the last ones we’ve been approving have fallen between 2.5 and 3 percent. Those are the numbers that have been coming in. They have, as I said, additional benefits that the merit employees do not have. Mr. Griffin, did I miss something? The committee was made up of, as I said, all of the cabinet, the division directors, the school, fire, and the library. It was just our collective conversation. If the board wants to change that, that’s why we’re here. Mr. Griffin If I could add one more point from a historical perspective, in fiscal 12’ we actually didn’t use the grid, we applied a .5% increase to the then merit employees and then the next year when the merit employees moved up a step it was essentially a 2.5% increase. Things can happen like that as long as you folks are aware and that we get approval. That’s done legislatively as well, that’s not something management would do and just say you have a .5% increase in this year. Those were the mechanics that we used in a non-union environment to help out the total picture of the budget versus the revenues and the spending cap – those three dynamics. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 18 Alderman Deane The steps are across the top? Mr. Griffin Correct. Alderman Deane Where does the 2.9% start? Is it throughout all of the steps? If I go to Grade 1, Step 1, and I take that $22,932.20 and I add 2.9% to it, I come up with $23,627.08? Mr. Griffin The consistent 2.9% is added uniformly to every grade starting with Step 16 through 20. As the Mayor indicated, everything to the left of that, 1 through 15 is the current grid. Alderman Siegel Being what percent again? Mr. Griffin It could 2.97%, some are 3.10%, and some are 3.7%. Alderman Siegel It sounds like we have this grid but we can selectively just not use it based on what you said. A statement was made “well, we gave a half of percent.” Mayor Lozeau It’s not selectively, it’s something that we have to come in and get permission for and we would adopt it. Alderman Siegel Okay. Mayor Lozeau In 2012, when we were struggling with things, we had a group of people that took no increase and then everyone else on the merit plan who stayed frozen on their grade and their step got .5%. It was not added into the grid like the 750 had been prior and so the following year, when they did move, their increase was less because they didn’t get that .5% again. Alderman Siegel I understand. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 19 Alderman Chasse I do have a problem with this. Here’s the big thing, most of the unions when they go to negotiate a contract, the first year they come in, a lot of them have 0% raise. These people here are guaranteed 2.9% every year. 2.9% would be higher than any of the union contracts that came in front of us. This is what happened with the last raise when you gave them the 2.9%, that a lot of the unions came back and phone calls were coming in saying “oh boy, merit employees got it again.” The unions were 1.75%, 2.2%. Can we arbitrarily change that to 2%? Mayor Lozeau You can do whatever you would like to do with that percentage but I will tell you that the union employees, if you ask them if they would prefer this to what they have, I can tell you that they would say no. Our merit employees are not allowed to negotiate for increases or for benefits and so the year that we said you are now going to pay 20% of your healthcare, the merit employees didn’t get to say I’d like to negotiate that and talk about it. They got it because that’s the decision that was made and that’s what happened. When the year came that we said it was going to be .5% and you weren’t going to move on the grid, they didn’t get to negotiate that. That’s how it was and that’s what happened. The negotiations with some of the unions that when you talk about 0%, they didn’t lose some of their other benefits and in some cases they weren’t paying more in their healthcare so it depended on when that started. Remember the union employees started in July for some of those things. I looked back at the history of when the UAW was created because we had more merit employees than we do today and that was a result of a group of merit employees that got together and unionized because they felt as though they were getting less. We just saw the same thing happen with the principals. We’ve now gone to 16 unions from 15 because the principals were watching the negotiations that the teachers were having and they were falling further behind. That created a problem from the principal’s perspective and so they have now created a union and will collectively bargain their agreements. Merit employees don’t have some of those additional benefits that unions have and the single biggest one of those is the ability to negotiate their pay and benefits, they don’t have that. That’s one of things that I think we have to consider when we do this. It’s not lost on me, as I do budgets, nor will it be on you, when you give somebody a 3% raise and the spending cap is 2%, you already at a disadvantage. I understand that whole heartedly but I also know that we are also in negotiations with contracts that have been expired for three or four years because they are still negotiating for pay and benefits that are different. Merit employees don’t have earned time, the UAW does. They don’t want to ever give that up and I can understand why. Those are things that other employees don’t have and that’s the balance that we are trying to strike here. Alderman Chasse The balance is that you try to treat all of your employees equal. Over a five year span, the merit employees will get a 14.5% raise. There is no union out there, and I don’t care if the union has different things, that’s what a union is versus merit employee. You have to look at the dollars here and 14.5% versus I don’t think there is a union that’s going to get 10% over a five year span so to me I don’t think this is fair because if I was running the show, all of my employees would be treated equally. Acting Chairman Caron How many merit employees do we now have in the city? Mayor Lozeau 121. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 20 Acting Chairman Caron Are you following the format because I know that the Hays Program has been part of the city since the mid 70’s and it does not get changed that often, I know. I also know why those employees decided to join a union. It was because there was a lot of discussion and unhappiness because a lot of the merit employees who put it a lot of hours because they were salaried, were not getting the benefits that were there. I understand your reasoning Alderman Chasse, but I also understand theirs as well so it’s really something that has to be weighed. This doesn’t get changed as often as we’d like. Alderman Deane, when you said it was changed about three years ago, that’s wonderful because I think from the time it started until the next change was almost fifteen years at least. We have to look at that as a total package as well and how we weigh that in the final analysis. 121 is not as many merit employees that I remember. Mayor Lozeau Just to add to your point, the merit grid was not changed three years ago; the last time it was changed was when healthcare went from the employee paying 5% to 10%. The merit employees were given a $750.00 stipend that was added into the grid at that time because that’s how they received it but to look at it the way we are looking at it tonight and adding steps, I don’t know when that happened last. All we are proposing tonight is that we want to add an additional five steps and take off the first three to move it along. If the committee doesn’t want to do that… Alderman Donchess I tend to agree with Alderman Chasse. I think that a lot of times the unions negotiate for years to try to get 3% per year. They can negotiate for years and never get that and this just happens as a matter of law. So right now the top level is 13 or 14? What’s the top step? Director Hill 15. Mayor Lozeau So the new ones are 16 through 20. Alderman Donchess I don’t get the concept of a person who reaches the top step and then goes beyond it. How does a person who say is at grade 20 and at step 15 and they are being paid $116,848.00, how do they get paid more than the top step on the merit grid? Mr. Griffin In the merit policy there’s a mechanism that allows them to get the average of the last three Consumer Price Index Urban Northeast. As the Mayor and Director Hill indicated, that used to be added essentially to their salary to provide a new base salary. What we are proposing today in this submittal is to have a lump sum paid. The other item that I think might not have been clearly articulated is that the grid hasn’t been changed since 1999 with the exception of the $750.00 added. Maybe Director Hill through the recruitment retention and other policies, it just seemed very strange to have 121 merit employees where most of them were going off the grid. That seems to mean you don’t have a usable grid in my opinion. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 21 Director Hill In 2007 they did add five steps onto the grid. Alderman Donchess How much more than the top step, 15, are some employees paid? Is it 3% or more than that? Mr. Griffin Over the last several years, they were paid at the CPIU Northeast. Last year was 2.3%; the prior year was 1.7%. It’s been a while since that number has been anything close to 3%. Alderman Donchess Does that accumulate and increase for someone year-by-year or is it just a single step above the top step on the grid. Mr. Griffin Since 2011 or maybe before, they would increase their base pay annually at a rate equal to the last three years of the CPIU. Alderman Donchess So there are people that are definitely over the grid by a fair number of dollars. Mr. Griffin Some more than others, that’s correct. Alderman Donchess So, a grade 20 employees, the top grade, what positions fit within that? Mr. Griffin That would be my position, and a few of my other colleagues. Director Hill might have the exact numbers but 18, 19, and 20 grades are generally reserved for the director level positions of divisions. Director Hill I can tell you exactly which positions they are currently. It’s the Fire Chief, Corporation Counsel, Director of Public Works, the CFO, Director of the Library, and the Director of Community and Public Health. Alderman Donchess What grade is the Community Development Director position? Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 22 Director Hill I believe that is a 19. Alderman Donchess This is a different point but philosophically – so we’ve got a lot of people who are making more than the Mayor. I’m not proposing we do anything about that but philosophically, I do have a bit of a problem with that. Outside of the uniform services, fire and police, what is the top position as far as pay? Director Hill The superintendent, I believe. Alderman Donchess What does the Mayor make? Director Hill $110,000.00 Mayor Lozeau The Mayor’s salary, by ordinance, is based on the CPIU. I believe it’s the superintendent. Director Hill I’ve got corporation counsel. Mayor Lozeau The superintendent makes more than corporation counsel. You may not have the superintendent. Alderman Donchess Which superintendent? Mayor Lozeau The school superintendent. Director Hill I don’t have any school positions. Mayor Lozeau Do you want to say outside of those? Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 23 Alderman Donchess Yes. Mayor Lozeau Without overtime pay? Alderman Donchess Yes. Mayor Lozeau Director Hersh was the highest paid who had been here for 14 years. She would have been, coming off the grid, she was at step 14 when she left on this grid, which would have been off of the grid for this year. She was at the $113,555. Alderman Donchess So you are saying that the Mayor’s position gets this three year average. Mayor Lozeau Right. Alderman Donchess And these people are getting 2.9% so potentially; the Mayor is losing ground versus the other employees every year. Mayor Lozeau Particularly the year that the Mayor chose not to take an increase because all of that compounded time was gone as well. But, yes, that does happen. We have a significant amount of employees who are hired in with this being their pay scale. It’s what they were counting on. My personal opinion is that I’m happy not to change the grid at all. The problem is that we’d have a dozen people off the grid and on top of that, the policy has been to add that CPIU to their salary and then continue to compound it, which I think makes for a very big problem even if it is less than 3%. I’d like to get people back on the grid where you can have a window into what’s happening and make sure that the grid is following the growth of our employees. The school this year changed their grid. Two years ago we were successful with the fire department changing their grid to having less steps and more along the lines of year 5, year 10, year 15 at 2%. If we put the merit employees on par with something like that, I’d want to do the same with the UAW. I think this city is much better served if everybody was on a smaller stepping grid schedule and all increases were based on performance. That’s just not really available to us. Alderman Donchess It used to be that the custom, not the law but the custom, that merit employees would receive the same raise as the public works employees based upon the union contract that existed over there. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 24 Mayor Lozeau The ASCME Contract? Because we didn’t have UAW, that might be why. Alderman Donchess Yes, the ASCME contract. If they got 2%, merit got 2%, if they got 1%, merit got 1%. Raises were higher then because inflation was much more active. They didn’t get it by operation of law but every year the Board of Alderman would enact an increase that was on par with public works. Alderman Sheehan This brought up two things for me. First of all, with the Mayor being paid more than – I think we need to keep in mind that it’s an elected position versus looking for someone with professional certifications. If it was a town manager, I think I would follow that logic, that that needs to be the highest paid person but in my professional background, I always made a lot more than my boss and he was very happy with that because when I was making money, he was making money. It’s not unheard of in the business community for that to be the case. When we want to have people with Master’s Degrees and certifications or the Bar Association, I think that’s something that we need to recognize financially. Looking at the grid, the thing that jumps out to me is that we talked about how it’s supposed to be fast loaded upfront and then slow down. Steps 14 and 15, just a couple of numbers I pulled, still have a 2.9% increases. I think what would make more sense would be to say at the beginning of someone’s career it’s a higher percentage but then come down to a very low percentage at the end where people generally – I mean they are not going to leave because they got this or that, it’s vaguely different but it seems to be very accelerated at the end of someone’s career versus having it be fast in the beginning and then kind of level off. Alderman Siegel I actually believe or not, Mayor I am empathetic because I think we are dealing with a lot of unintended consequences to a certain extent. You don’t want skilled people to leave because they don’t get paid well but the problem is that everybody is lumped in the same grid but everybody does not have the same relative value based on either performance or skill set scarcity. For example, for me personally, I am worried to death about the people that have training on our existing computer systems leaving because they are fairly irreplaceable but there’s no way to account for that here. I also like to point out that the 2.9% is a compounded 2.9% so it’s probably more close to 15% not 14.5% and it is reasonable to say that most unions these days aren’t getting those kinds of raises so I am in a quandary. On the one hand, I understand we don’t want skilled people to leave but on the other hand, I just don’t understand the 2.9%. It’s really difficult for me to swallow. Mayor Lozeau It might be worthwhile for me to provide the comparison to the committee when you are considering this. Compare the same timeframe of pay and then the additional benefits that union employees get that merit employees don’t. They don’t get 90 days of sick time paid out when they leave. There’s a host of things that they don’t have. I don’t want to be in the same place that we were before. Maybe back in the day when the ASCME raise was the same as the merit employees, that was acceptable for a time but at some point, it got to be that it wasn’t acceptable and they unionized and now we have two UAW Unions. I can’t tell you exactly what that result was, I wasn’t here but from the employees that I know that were here, what they have said is that they felt like union employees were getting more because it’s not just about the rate of pay. I’m happy to provide some of those things for folks to look at. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 25 Alderman Siegel It might make our decision a little bit more educated. That kind of information would help me because I could make a better decision as to whether or not this makes sense. That 2.9% is hard to shake. Mayor Lozeau I am sitting here with staff who knows that I argue about this all of the time. As I said, we have a couple of unions right now that we are in negotiations with and I’m looking back at what others had. You recall the letter that I sent out this year about my concerns with different contracts that came in and why. What I have come to understand about this is that the system that is in place, as Alderman Caron was saying, is the Hay System. We create a job description, that job description goes through the system, it’s pegged at a certain grade, and that’s the parameters that you work in. When it was recommended to me that we add steps on, I accepted the recommendation of staff because of the other things that I have considered that I said I would provide to you. When you start looking at this, if I am somebody on step 20 and that grid was going to end at the $116,000, and now we are proposing that these additional five steps that it go up to $134,000, and we say for an employee here giving them a 2% is fine, I would agree. But, if I go up here on step 1 and somebody’s making $35,400 per year, 2% is very different to them than the 2% to somebody making over $100,000. We don’t build some of those things into these grids either and I think we should. Even when we were looking at healthcare, I thought boy, I’d like it to be different for someone that makes $40,000 versus somebody that makes $80,000. How you figure that in here is really a challenge. We looked at the system that we had, we added those five steps on it at that percentage. We also have to remember that the ones that are off of the grid, if you see them back on the grid, you can’t see at less pay and so where do they end up? That’s a challenge and I’ve looked at that more times than I want to tell you and not just as it relates to merit employees. I am a fan of performance merit increases. I think a grid and a step should just be to bring an employee in at a fair wage. Alderman Siegel I am not making the motion but I am making a statement about a motion. Is it possible for the committee to consider tabling this in anticipation of that information? I could go either way and I feel like that information would help me make a better decision whichever way I want to go. I am not comfortable making that decision without that information. Mayor Lozeau Understood. Alderman Chasse When you do your analysis, can you add in the benefits and show their full salary and then what it will cost city – like if you go from 15 to 16 on the bottom one, it’s a little less than $4,000, how much of that cost is for the pension plan? The $113,000 is really not her salary; her salary is more than that because you have to add in the portion of the medical benefits that the city pays in the analysis. Mayor Lozeau I can see what analyses we have already done but I think that would be the same one I am showing you. The unions, in their edition, that doesn’t show you the cost of their benefits either. Maybe the easiest way to do it might be to compare the UAW grid to the merit grid. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 26 Alderman Siegel We are really talking about cost and not salaries so it’s total cost. Salaries are not the sole component. Mayor Lozeau I agree. I am just saying that puts a whole different dynamic into it. What I’ll try to do is give you vanilla, which is these salaries, these benefits, this group has these and this group has these and then the percentage increase that has happened and then I’ll see if I can put the whole sundae in with what would it look like salary full loaded. Alderman Soucy Just for clarification, since we have segmented the whole ordinance, Alderman Siegel, were you talking about just tabling the retirement portion or the entire ordinance? Alderman Siegel I don’t believe they are separable. That’s a point of order but I think they are one in the same, aren’t they? Mayor Lozeau They are. They are not divisible. Acting Chairman Caron Mayor is this time sensitive because I had the same idea. Can you get information to us? Would the committee have to meet sooner rather than later? Mayor Lozeau I guess I can put it in two ways. It’s divisible if you want to accept the current merit grid as it is and leave it alone and then introduce something that relates just to the grid. It’s no more time sensitive than anything else. When we set the budget we can bring it in with the way it has been without it being a problem. Again, it’s six employees off of the grid now and a dozen off the grid by the end of this year. Mr. Griffin Twelve off now and twelve to come. Alderman Deane When did they fall off the grid? Mr. Griffin It might have been three or four years ago for some of them. Alderman Deane Three or four years ago? Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 27 Mr. Griffin We’d have to look at each one. They are all separate individuals. Twelve is what is going on right now and another twelve by the end of the year. Alderman Deane By ordinance, this was supposed to be brought in the first of January? Mayor Lozeau I don’t know what the date was. Alderman Deane Yes, it was January 1st or the first in January. Mayor Lozeau I don’t think there’s any rush Alderman Deane. Alderman Deane I’m just saying the way the ordinance reads is every three years after January 1, 2011, or 2010. You can amend this, the rest of this, if it matters, and just remove the merit salary grid and pass it in that fashion or you can table it and bring back the request that has been asked of Mr. Griffin and pass it as a whole. Mayor Lozeau Just so that I make sure that I understand, when you say that, they would still have the grid; it would just be the grid that exists today. Alderman Deane Right and that wouldn’t change. We had this problem back in 2005 and it was with the fire department. Once they were promoted and they were no longer fire fighters they were still getting stipends as all of the firefighters were – the hazmat, the dive team. You go right through all of those stipends for certifications that were giving out and they were all still getting that. I went down with Mrs. Joyce at the time who was the Human Resources Director and we had a conversation with them and we reduced some of those stipends away but that ended up in turn, putting them above their salary. I believe the grid was changed in ’06 to put people back on it. Maybe Director Hill knows the dates better than I do. Director Hill Your dates are very close to what legal provided for me. The history of it was 1996 was the first grid; in 2001 they deleted the minimum steps at the very bottom and added four steps. In 2002 they added a COLA to every step. In 2007 is when fire issues happened and they added five steps and then in 2008 is the last time there was any major change and that was the $750.00 which threw all of the percentages out of kilter from the original theory of the grid which was to provide the early acceleration and then slow down as you made it through your career. It was a good plan with unintended consequences. Really, except for the addition of some steps, there hasn’t been any major change to the individual numbers on the grid in a very long time. Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 28 Alderman Siegel I wouldn’t say it’s a sense of urgency but the body of the legislation had one very important change and that was eliminating the compounding salary and I’d really like to see that get in pronto. If there were some way to approve the body of the legislation which didn’t seem to be any type of controversy versus the salary grid, that would be great. Alderman Chasse We want to keep it all together. MOTION BY ALDERMAN CHASSE TO TABLE PENDING RECEIPT OF INFORMATION TO BE PROVIDED BY THE MAYOR, THE CFO, AND THE DIRECTOR OF HUMAN RESOURCES ON THE QUESTION Alderman Deane The motion to table at the committee level basically falls under the jurisdiction of what the chairman wants to do. Although it is a non-debatable motion, I have seen discussion after the fact so the leniency falls on you, Alderman Caron. Alderman Chasse It’s always been non-debatable in committee and now you are playing games with it. Alderman Deane That’s not true. Alderman Chasse It’s always been in this committee, as long as I’ve been around here. Every committee that I have been on it has been non-debatable. Alderman Deane Not me. MOTION CARRIED O-14-020 Endorsers: Alderman-at-Large Diane Sheehan Alderwoman Pamela T. Brown ESTABLISHING A GREELEY PARK ADVISORY COMMITTEE  Also assigned to the Board of Public Works; to appear on its 4/24/14 agenda MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO RECOMMEND TO TABLE UNTIL AFTER THE DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WORKS MEETS ON APRIL 24, 2014 Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 29 ON THE QUESTION ALDERMAN SHEEHAN Point of order. Alderman Siegel There’s a motion to table right? We have to vote. Alderman Sheehan Personal privilege. If there was an intention to table this and this is the only reason that I came here tonight, it would have been courteous as a professional courtesy for someone to mention that they had the intention of tabling it. I had no idea of that, I’ve been here for 2 ½ hours, and paying a babysitter to be with my kids so I could speak on this. I’m speechless. MOTION TO TABLE WITHDRAWN MOTION BY ALDERMAN CHASSE TO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE ON THE QUESTION Alderman Sheehan I appreciate my colleague’s indulgence on this. The idea for this started percolating with all of the work that we tried to do for the band shell. When we were looking at noise ordinances and how to address that, it came up frequently that there’s a lot of things that have to do with Greeley Park that make it special. I started thinking about wouldn’t it be a great thing if there were something like the friends of the Nashua Library that would work for this. After that it kind of died down and then came up again. I think it’s important that we recognize that a lot angst is driven by people feeling like things are going to change or there isn’t a plan or people aren’t having input. In the interest of trying to get some things, and I have a list of things that I thought it’s probably something that’s going to address, but modeling it after Mines Falls and the friends of the Nashua Library. I know that Greeley Park has been compared often in all of these discussions to the Boston Commons and they also have a friend’s type of a set-up. Theirs is based on the perseveration and enhancement of the Boston Public Gardens. Looking at that and trying to do something where all of the different groups that are using it, are able to have a voice which allows them also to have some sort of peer cooperation because we have heard “well, this group is doing this and they weren’t supposed to and that group is doing this and they weren’t supposed to be.” Getting people to the table in an organized manner to work some of those out. There are a lot of guidelines that supposedly Greeley Park is subject to that seem to be implied a lot and there’s innuendo but there’s nothing that is specific like here are the guiding principles of it. Looking at putting together a history so people can understand planning for what should the future look like. Having some sort of master plan for where it should be going or what sort of use it should have. There have been different tones described. Should it be like a gym or a spa? It’s time to have that conversation and have these people coming together. They can also work on advocacy for you know, we need new Hibachi’s, the Hibachi’s are bad. I know the gardener’s tried very hard to get the list down from a seven year waiting list and now it’s down to a one year which is great but I think having a more mechanized way to work on these things to enhance it and to preserve it is the way to really look at this as well as to organize volunteer efforts like they have with Mines Falls. The friends of the Public Gardens do the Mall on Commonwealth Avenue as well as the Boston Commons and they have a really nice web page that goes through what their perceived threats are to the parks. What they are trying to protect, the history of the park from the beginning and how it was Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 30 originally just smelly water that they filled in. Those are the sort of things that we could be and should be doing in a way that recognizes that it is our gem and the varying people who use it. Alderman Soucy Alderman Sheehan, if this committee was in existence right now, what role do you see that it would playing in the Legacy Playground issues that are going on right now. Alderman Sheehan Hopefully, they would have had a plan already so it would have either met that plan or not met it. They could have advocated for this or that. Alderman Soucy Would this committee take away any of the oversight responsibility or authority of this board? Alderman Sheehan It would not. The Mines Falls Park Advisory Committee has one and don’t usurp any of the authority of our board. They tend to coordinate volunteer efforts, advocate for resources and things of that nature as does the Nashua Public Library’s friends of group who also does a lot of fundraising which could be an added up side of this as well. Alderman Soucy It says that this legislation shall take affect following its passage. I’m thinking there is so much going on with Greeley Park right now and I don’t think this is the time to add layers of bureaucracy or anything else. That’s why I would prefer to see it tabled until this issue goes over one way or the other rather than have another group come in and eject an opinion or whatever. I would just rather see the Legacy Playground issue go away first. Alderman Sheehan I entirely agree and I had that same fear but I wanted to make sure that it was addressed this time. Last time after the band shell, we were all so sick of it that it never got picked up again. Now something else has come up and it’s an issue so I thought it was important that we say this is something that we need to talk about. Alderman Soucy I think we are both in agreement and I hope you bring it up again but I’m think now is not the time. Alderman Siegel I agree with my colleague Alderman Soucy that we have had plenty of input on Greeley Park. I don’t see that having a special committee is going to provide us with anymore specifically more useful input than what we have gotten. We have been overwhelmed with this. It’s choking off all city business as it is. This legislation the way it’s written is that this committee will advise the Mayor on what to do and we are the Board of Alderman and we are not giving up our authority over Greeley Park and I have a problem with that. I also don’t understand the constitution of this committee. I don’t understand the idea that we have a 1/3 rule of residents of the ward where the park is located. Where did that come from? It seems so arbitrary at best. I mean does the rest of city not matter? It seems to me that if people are willing to serve the city, let them serve Personnel – 04/21/14 Page 31 and can we put them on something that’s a little bit more useful. We don’t have a shortage of people giving us input here. I’d rather see this legislation killed in committee but I’d be happy to table it if that’s the choice of the committee. Alderman McGuinness How is this proposed committee any different from the Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee that was disposed of about 1 ½ months ago? Alderman Sheehan This is for the benefit of Greeley Park and the people that use it, not for the Board of Alderman or Parks and Rec. That is why they would go to the Mayor and the parks and rec supervisor to say we really need to start addressing this, can you put it in the budget. It has nothing to do with the Board of Alderman and it’s supposed to reflect the people who are actually using the park. I would have also liked to have seen someone from the Arts Commission but this was just a starting point. It’s specifically about Greeley Park and not all the parks. Alderman Chasse I’m interested to see what the Board of Public Works is going to do with this. MOTION BY ALDERMAN CHASSE TO TABLE UNTIL AFTER THE BOARD OF PUBLIC WORKS COMMITTEE MEETING SCHEDULED APRIL 24, 2014 MOTION CARRIED DISCUSSION Alderman Chasse Alderman Sheehan, I don’t expect you to come back for this one but you are welcome. I will bring it back to the table after the Board of Public Works meeting. PUBLIC COMMENT - None REMARKS BY THE ALDERMEN – None POSSIBLE NON-PUBLIC SESSION ADJOURNMENT MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO ADJOURN MOTION CARRIED The meeting was declared closed at 8:52 p.m. Alderman Michael Soucy Committee Clerk Proposed Charges to the Merit Employee Rules and Regulations Work Schedule - New language is added to define a standard work schedule and to require approval for variations from the standard schedule. Attendance - New language prohibiting time stamping at in our new Kronos Time & Attendance System for another employee. This new language also provides for progressive discipline up to and including termination of employment for violation of the rule. Personnel File - A form is now required to review personnel files and this language has been added to the section. Exit Interviews - Language has been added requiring the terminating employees to return all City property during the exit interview. Merit Pay Program - Replaced the language: "shall be eligible for a salary increase equal to the three (3) year average of the CPI-U Northeast." To "shall be eligible for an annual lump sum payment equal to the three (3) year average of the CPI-U Northeast." This changes this to a single payment in place of in increase which compounds each year. Payroll Deductions - removed US Savings bonds and added Short-Term Disability and Roth IRA as optional payroll deductions. Workers' Compensation - clarified the language regarding continuation of benefits during a workers' compensation leave to note that full benefits include "vacation and sick leave" accruals. Personal Days - added language to make it clear that personal time is not paid out when an employee leaves. Also, added language to prevent an employee who is out on a leave of absence from receiving an award of personal days until they return to work. Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) - updated the summary to cover new federal regulations and to direct the employees to the act for additional details. Benefits - Health Insurance - added the High Deductible Plan with HSA which is the new option offered last year. Removed the language known as the "birthday rule" which provided: "Employees who are married to another employee of the City, who also subscribes to a plan, will be subject to the birthday rule. The birthday rule states, whichever spouse's birthday falls first in a calendar year, is designated as the subscriber to any health plan. " Since the health care plans are self funded there is no real advantage to requiring one spouse rather than another to be primary for coverage. Dental Insurance - added the "buy up" plan option as a voluntary benefit Long-Term Disability - removed the coverage for part time employees to match the current policy. Short-Term Disability - Added a voluntary short-term disability option Merit Sick Leave Bank - Included the Merit Sick Leave Bank Program which has been in effect since 2004. Flexible Spending Account (FSA) - changed the annual cap to the new federal cap of $2500 per year. Also, noted that a family is not allowed, by federal law, to have both a FSA and an HSA at the same time. Retirement System - Changed the current employee contribution to 7% and notified employees that New Hampshire Retirement System sets the employer and employee contributions every other year. Proposed new Merit Salary Grid - removes the lowest three steps and adds steps to compensate for current salary trends and to guarantee employee wages are on the grid. Without changes to the grid we currently have 12 employees who earn more than the highest step in their grade and as of July 1,2014, we will have an additional 12 employees who are off the grid. Other than the addition of the $750 to each step at the time of the prior health care contribution increase, the merit salary schedule has not been adjusted since 1999. Proposed Charges to the Merit Employee Rules and Regulations Work Schedule - New language is added to define a standard work schedule and to require approval for variations from the standard schedule. Attendance - New language prohibiting time stamping at in our new Kronos Time & Attendance System for another employee. This new language also provides for progressive discipline up to and including termination of employment for violation of the rule. Personnel File - A form is now required to review personnel files and this language has been added to the section. Exit Interviews - Language has been added requiring the terminating employees to return all City property during the exit interview. Merit Pay Program - Replaced the language: "shall be eligible for a salary increase equal to the three (3) year average of the CPI-U Northeast." To "shall be eligible for an annual lump sum payment equal to the three (3) year average of the CPI-U Northeast." This changes this to a single payment in place of in increase which compounds each year. Payroll Deductions - removed US Savings bonds and added Short-Term Disability and Roth IRA as optional payroll deductions. Workers' Compensation - clarified the language regarding continuation of benefits during a workers' compensation leave to note that full benefits include "vacation and sick leave" accruals. Personal Days - added language to make it clear that personal time is not paid out when an employee leaves. Also, added language to prevent an employee who is out on a leave of absence from receiving an award of personal days until they return to work. Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) - updated the summary to cover new federal regulations and to direct the employees to the act for additional details. Benefits - Health Insurance - added the High Deductible Plan with HSA which is the new option offered last year. Removed the language known as the "birthday rule" which provided: "Employees who are married to another employee of the City, who also subscribes to a plan, will be subject to the birthday rule. The birthday rule states, whichever spouse's birthday falls first in a calendar year, is designated as the subscriber to any health plan." Since the health care plans are self funded there is no real advantage to requiring one spouse rather than another to be primary for coverage. Dental Insurance - added the "buy up" plan option as a voluntary benefit Long-Term Disability - removed the coverage for part time employees to match the current policy. Short-Term Disability - Added a voluntary short-term disability option Merit Sick Leave Bank - Included the Merit Sick Leave Bank Program which has been in effect since 2004. Flexible Spending Account (FSA) - changed the annual cap to the new federal cap of $2500 per year. Also, noted that a family is not allowed, by federal law, to have both a FSA and an HSA at the same time. Retirement System - Changed the current employee contribution to 7% and notified employees that New Hampshire Retirement System sets the employer and employee contributions every other year. Proposed new Merit Salary Grid - removes the lowest three steps and adds steps to compensate for current salary trends and to guarantee employee wages are on the grid. Without changes to the grid we currently have 12 employees who earn more than the highest step in their grade and as of July 1,2014, we will have an additional 12 employees who are off the grid. Other than the addition of the $750 to each step at the time of the prior health care contribution increase, the merit salary schedule has not been adjusted since 1999.  APPENDIX A Merit Salary Grid Effective July 1, 2014 ^Al 4 1 2 3 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 1 22,932.20 23,627.08 24,343.72 25,082.81 25,845.06 26,597.91 27,373.35 28,172.05 28,994.71 29,842.05 30,714.81 31,613.76 32,539.67 33,493.36 34,464.67 35,464.14 36,492.60 37,550.89 38,639.86 39,760.42 2 23,338.72 24,046.36 24,776.16 25,528.83 26,305.08 27,071.73 27,861.38 28,674.73 29,512.47 30,375.34 31,264.10 32,179.53 33,122.41 34,093.59 35,082.30 36,099.69 37,146.58 38,223.83 39,332.32 40,472.96 3 23,893.18 24,618.20 25,365.92 26,137.07 26,932.38 27,717.85 28,526.89 29,360.19 30,218.50 31,102.56 32,013.13 32,951.03 33,917.06 34,912.07 35,924.52 36,966.33 38,038.35 39,141.47 40,276.57 41,444.59 4 24,551.38 25,297.00 26,055.99 26,859.06 27,676.98 28,484.79 29,316.83 30,173.84 31,056.55 31,965.75 32,902.22 33,866.79 34,860.29 35,883.60 36,924.22 37,995.03 39,096.88 40,230.69 41,397.38 42,597.91 5 25,244.83 26,012.15 26,803.50 27,619.65 28,461.36 29,292.70 30,148.98 31,030.95 31,939.38 32,875.06 33,838.81 34,831.48 35,853.92 36,907.04 37,977.34 39,078.69 40,211.97 41,378.12 42,578.08 43,812.85 6 26,115.76 26,910.37 27,729.86 28,575.03 29,446.68 30,307.58 31,194.31 32,107.64 33,048.37 34,017.32 35,015.34 36,043.30 37,102.10 38,192.66 39,300.25 40,439.95 41,612.71 42,819.48 44,061.25 45,339.02 7 27,369.42 28,266.90 29,192.87 30,150.75 31,140.90 32,052.63 32,991.71 33,958.96 34,955.23 35,981.39 37,038.33 38,126.98 39,248.29 40,403.24 41,574.93 42,780.61 44,021.24 45,297.86 46,61i.50 47,963.23 8 28,433.36 29,408.85 30,418.72 31,464.17 32,546.46 33,500.35 34,482.86 35,494.85 36,537.20 37,610.82 38,716.64 39,855.64 41,028.81 42,237.17 43,462.05 44,722.45 46,019.40 47,353.96 48,727.23 50,140.32 9 29,694.52 30,759.37 31,863.39 33,008.03 34,194.78 35,198.12 36,231.57 37,296.01 38,392.39 39,521.66 40,684.81 41,882.86 43,116.84 44,387.85 45,675.10 46,999.68 48,362.67 49,765.18 51,208.37 52,693.42 10 30,715.58 31,840.69 33,008.05 34,219.24 35,475.90 36,517.68 37,590.71 38,695.93 • 39,834.31 41,006.84 42,214.54 43,458.48 44,739.74 46,059.43 47,395.15 48,769.61 50,183.93 •51,639.27 53,136.80 54,677.77 11 34,399.09 35,662.51 36,973.37 38,333.45 39,744.60 40,914.44 42,119.37 43,360.45 44,638.77 45,955.43 47,311.60 48,708.44 50,147.20 51,629.11 53,126.35 54,667.02 56,252.36 57,883.68 59,562.31 61,289.61 12 37,244.52 38,614.83 40,036.59 41,511.73 43,042.26 44,311.03 45,617.86 46,963.89 48,350.31 49,778.32 51,249.32 52,764.14 54,324.57 55,931.81 57,553.83 59,222.89 60,940.36 62,707.63 64,526.15 66,397.41 13 40,611.18 42,107.89 43,660.81 45,272.04 46,943.76 48,329.57 49,756.96 51,227.17 52,741.48 54,301.22 55,907.76 57,562.49 59,266.87 61,022.37 62,792.02 64,612.99 66,486.76 68,414.88 70,398.91 72,440.48 14 44,445.20 46,085.88 47,788.16 49,554.36 51,386.88 52,905.99 54,470.67 56,082.29 57,742.25 59,452.02 61,213.08 63,026.97 64,895.28 66,819.64 68,757.41 70,751.37 72,803.16 74,914.46 77,086.98 79,322.50 15 48,802.05 50,606.32 52,478.33 54,420.64 56,435.88 58,106.46 59,827.15 61,599.46 63,424.95 65,305.20 67,241.85 69,236.61 71,291.21 73,407.44 75,536.26 77,726.81 79,980.88 82,300.33 84,687.04 87,142.96 15 53,126.17 55,092.84 57,133.36 59,250.50 61,447.14 63,268.05 65,143.60 67,075.40 69,065.17 71,114.63 73,225.56 75,399.83 77,639.33 79,946.01 82,264.44 84,650.11 87,104,97 89,631.01 92,230.31 94,904.99 17 57,839.48 59,983.13 62,207.28 64,514.93 66,909.24 68,894.02 70,938.34 73,043.99 75,212.81 77,446.69 79,747.60 82,117.52 84,558.55 87,072.81 89,597.92 92,196.26 94,869.95 97,621.18 100,452.20 103,365.31 18 62,977.92 65,314.51 67,738.84 70,254.19 72,864.00 75,027.42 77,255.74 79,550.91 81,914.94 84,349.89 86,857.88 89,441.12 92,101.86 94,842.41 97,592.84 100,423.03 103,335.30 106,332.02 109,415.65 112,588.71 19 68,576.85 71,123.63 73,766.03 76,507.65 79,352.22 81,710.29 84,139.10 86,640.77 89,217.49 91,871.51 94,605.16 97,420.81 100,320.94 103,308.07 106,304.00 109,386.82 112,559.04 115,823.25 119,182.12 122,638.41 20 75,355.92 78,156.79 81,062.80 84,077.91 87,206.22 89,799.91 92,471.40 95,558.15 98,057.24 100,976.46 103,983.25 107,080.25 110,270.16 113,555.76 116,848.88 120,237.49 123,724.38 127,312.39 131,004.45 134,803.58 r A