Parks and rec. board discusses salaries with four employees
Facts and figures were given at personnel meeting Tuesday
At a personnel meeting called for last night by Grafton Parks and Recreation (GPR) Director Bill Dahl, GPR employees discussed a recent salary offer presented to them the Park Board personnel committee. Present were GPR employees Dahl, Tanna Aasand, Kurt Anderson, Kayla Eide and Dean Feltman, along with Park Board financial committee members Corey Burns, Scott Hills, Brad Burianek, Kerry Demars and Todd Storey.
Things got a bit contentious at times as the discussions took place.
Dahl mentioned that he called for this meeting so that staff could go over in more detail the amazing job and what had been done, along with their thoughts, as he thought at his evaluation meeting that he really was asked about 2012 only.
Tanna Aasand presented some facts and figures posted on the wall pertaining to GPR’s accomplishments over the last 5-6 years, since the wholesale change in staff, in contrast to what had been done in the previous 10 years.
The financial committee had offered a 3 percent take home pay raise, based on current salaries, with a two percent match to their pension fund.
At the original evaluation meeting, Dahl had met for around 1 ½ hours with committee members. Park Board members brought up that Dahl had said when asked what GPR wanted that he had said they were hoping for at least a 2 percent increase. He said he was thinking to at least cover social security increases they knew were coming and didn’t know if it would be 2-3 percent or whatever. Demars mentioned the same two to three percent, but said Dahl didn’t talk about the social security increase. Burianek at one point said he felt good in giving them three percent as Dahl had only asked for two. Dahl mentioned that he felt that his evaluation meeting had been intimidating and that it was somewhat unfair. Burns and others apologized if he felt that way, reiterating that GPR has done a great job, and said thank you.
Aasand said as part of her presentation that back in 2005 GPR had salaries of $187,000 based on a budget of $328,000, whereas now in 2012 the base salary is at $207,000 with an actual budget of $564,000 (including grant funds). The percentage of salary vs budget has decreased significantly. In the meantime, the cost of living has increased 23.5%, so they aren’t even meeting that. She also stated that in 2005 the department had 64 employees and had lost around $9600 annually, yet now GPR averages a gain of $25,000 annually.