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HomeMy WebLinkAbout02/10/2025 - Meeting Minutes Minutes Meeting Citizens’ Compensation Advisory Committee February 10, 2025 Members Present: Brandon Dew (Chair) J. Clair Baldwin (Vice-Chair) Leandro Tane Casey Lund Mike Terry Tia Larsen Members Excused: Jeff Worthington Staff Present: David Salazar, Compensation Manager Michael Jenson, Senior Compensation Analyst Lori Gaitin, Benefits Manager Penny Lopez, Human Resources Technician Dave Buchanan, Chief Human Resources Officer Guests: John Stevens, SLC Firefighters’ Local 81 (IAFF) A recording of these proceedings is on file and available for review by request from the SLC- HR department. Meeting Open & Welcome: Chair Brandon Dew called the meeting to order and established a quorum with enough members present. Review & adopt Approval of Minutes: Mike Terry motioned to approve the January 13 & 27, 2025 meeting minutes. Leandro Tane seconded the motion. All members voted in favor to adopt and approve the minutes for both meetings. Public comment: None David Salazar introduced Dave Buchanan as the new Chief Human Resources Officer. Dave talked about his experience with the city’s Human Resources Department, which spans a total of five years with the city including his last role as the Deputy Chief HR Officer. David Salazar also informed the committee about state legislative action the department is monitoring following passage of House Bill 267, which proposes elimination of collective bargaining for all public employers statewide. While waiting for final determination and legislative action taken on this legislation, David noted city leaders is intent on reviewing and assessing the impact this legislation has on future collective bargaining efforts with all three of the city’s union groups, including AFSCME, Firefighters Local 81, and Salt Lake Police (Officers) Association. Discussion of topics and/or recommendations to be included in the committee’s 2025 annual report: Relative to the committee’s 2025 annual report, David Salazar noted a draft of the report was previously emailed to all members. Topics and information included in the draft reflect material brought to the committee for review and discussion. Purpose & Introduction - Beyond changes to members names, no significant changes were included in this section of the report. Section One: Upon closer review of the first section of the report, Tia Larsen called for the addition of clarifying language in reference WorldatWork’s 2024-25 salary budget report and grammatical corrections including removal of a duplicate word. In addition to providing suggested language updates, members Tia Larsen, Clair Baldwin, and Casey Lund confirmed they had no concerns with the draft language drafted for this section. David emphasized all other information contained in this section, including the three tables with past and future projected salary budget forecast information, reflects the same data previously presented to the committee. As for the committee’s recommendation following this section of the report, committee chair Brandon Dew suggested members consider mirroring results reported by WorldatWork’s 2024-25 salary budget survey, which include an overall salary budget increase by no less than 4% and adjustment to the range structure by no less than 2.5%. Members including Mike Terry, Casey Lund, and Tia Larsen all concurred. Clair Baldwin posed a question on the recommendation for a range structure adjustment, particularly as it relates to the city’s group of non-represented employees. He suggested a 3% adjustment may be more appropriate out of concern that past city pay practices may have more severely limited the pay increases given to non-represented employees. Leandro Tane followed up with a subsequent question asking, regardless of the amount of the overall range structure adjustment given, has the city analyzed how well aligned to market data is employees’ actual pay. David Salazar explained how the city’s analysis takes market into account for both comparisons to employee “actual pay” and “pay ranges” city jobs are slotted into. He further emphasized the city’s goal and objective in every case is to ensure that both actual median employee pay and salary ranges job are slotted into measure as close to within 2% of market as possible to ensure on-going competitiveness. David stated that if and when either employee median actual pay or job range assignments are outside these parameters, market pay adjustments to rectify one or both of these situations are typically made. Addressing Clair Baldwin’s question about non-represented employees, David asked if his concern was aimed primarily at the lack of range penetration non-represented employees experienced in the past when range adjustments were equal to general increases given. Clair confirmed his concern in large part stemmed from instances when, for example, an employee receives a 3% general base pay increase is matched by a 3% range adjustment and the net result is no change to the employee relative pay position, or compa-ratio. David responded by noting the committee’s recommendation to grant smaller range adjustments compared to general base pay increases beginning in 2024 has effectively eliminated this concern. Following this explanation, the committee’s consensus was to recommend an overall salary budget increase by no less than 4% and adjustment to the range structure by no less than 2.5%. Section Two: Michael Jenson highlighted relevant statistics noted in this section of the report, including the number of job benchmarks analyzed, explanation of the benchmark groupings for non-represented employees, AFSCME, and public safety jobs, and guidelines for determining market comparability (e.g. significantly vs. slightly lagging or leading benchmarks). Michael summarized and explained the data displayed in the tables in this section showing the total number of benchmark jobs analyzed for each group. When noting a new approach to aging market data from January to July, Brandon Dew suggested this change in practice should be noted and highlighted in the report. David Salazar noted there has been no significant change to the data shown previously to the committee for the non-represented benchmark market pay comparison. When asked by Tia Larsen about the footnote regarding market pay data normalized to the Salt Lake City market, Michael and David explained the footnote applied only to the Principal Planner benchmark which is the only benchmark in this group for which data is collected and analyzed exclusively from other U.S. cities designated as similar to Salt Lake City for purposes of comparing the Planner role. For the AFSCME group of benchmark jobs included in this section, Michael pointed to the same language the committee note should be added to indicate the market data displayed was aged from January to July is now also included. As a result of the change in aging the market data from January to July, David noted the most significant change for this group is that no benchmark jobs are in the significantly lagging category. Leandro Tane suggested adding dates to further clarify the specific time period associated with the number of incumbents (or, city employees) and market salary headers to each of the tables. For the Public Safety section, Michael highlighted the language summarizing the methodology used for analyzing market pay for the public safety benchmarks. Relative to the list of cities included in this year’s public safety analysis, Brandon Dew suggested displaying a year-over-year comparison of which cities were included (e.g. a side-by-side list of 2024 vs. 2025 participants). Clair Baldwin also noted the importance of highlighting the year-to-year differences, particularly regarding the loss of South Davis Fire District which is believed to serve the second largest constituency served by a fire agency. While reviewing the pay information noted for Firefighter/Engineer, Mike Terry suggested a notation indicating the entry rate is in fact the 2-year step rate (as mentioned during a previous committee discussion). After agreeing to adopt refined language suggested by Leandro Tane to make more clear the committee’s recommendation includes market adjustments made are “for employees in benchmark and associated jobs,” David Salazar presented and the committee discussed which informational articles they wish to add as appendices to supplement the annual report. The committee consensus was to include each of the following documents. • Workspan Daily Article (December 19, 2024), “WTW: U.S. Employers Project 3.7% Salary Increase Budgets for 2025” • The Conference Board’s research report, U.S. Salary Increase Budgets 2024-2025. • City Council Resolution 20 of 2023 • SLC Pay Guidelines for Non-Represented Employees Upon completion of the committee’s review and approval, David Salazar indicated a copy of the final report would be sent to all committee members for review inspection. Clair Baldwin made a motion to approve the report including the committee’s edits and modifications discussed. The motion to approve was seconded by Casey Lund. The vote to adopt and approve the annual report was unanimous in the affirmative. Brandon Dew confirmed the next committee meeting is scheduled in the fall on October 6, 2025. David Salazar informed the committee that in the interim no meeting in May should be needed. He also announced the tentative date set for presentation of the committee report by the Chair to the city council is set for March 25,2025 The meeting was adjourned at 4:45 p.m.