County compensation arguments evolve

WASHINGTON — Washington County supervisors remain undecided on whether they should unilaterally determine their own salaries, or reinstate an advisory body to guide those decisions, which was recently dissolved by a state law.

The item is back up for a third round of discussion at the board’s next regular meeting on July 30. Supervisors who had hoped to hear a wave of public feedback on the issue after it first came up earlier this month plan now to more actively seek out constituents’ opinions before moving forward.

“Some of you guys may have to go out and ask the public,” Board of Supervisors Chair Richard Young said at Tuesday’s meeting. “I asked people, I didn’t just let people come to me. Because a lot of people won’t come to us.”

Young and Supervisor Stan Stoops both said they’d heard from community members who wanted to reinstate the compensation board, a move that would require a resolution from the board and could be reversed by future ones.

Young said constituents he spoke with worried about politically-motivated pay decisions without a compensation board. But other supervisors, like Jack Seward Jr., have argued that the advisory group lacks any real power since elected officials ultimately make the final decision to fund pay scale changes.

Seward also said the compensation commission didn’t accurately represent the public, since it was composed of individuals handpicked by the elected officials themselves, who were more likely to hold said officials in high regards, or at least be perceived as biased by voters.

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“I’m not casting any aspersions at all on anybody that’s been selected to represent any elected official,” he said. “They have the best intentions and all that, but to be honest, the public just does not understand what goes into all that.”

Other elected officials, however, said they chose commission representatives who worked with their staff at times, but were distant enough to remain unbiased. County Recorder Teresa Mangold’s representative is an attorney in the area, that she said “understands the value our office provides.” County Auditor Dan Widmer said his representative was a local grocery store manager, who Widmer said understood “the value of a good worker.”

County Attorney Nathan Repp said he had worked hard to find an adequately unbiased representative of his own when he first entered office.

“I think maybe there’s a little bit of umbrage with the language that it’s, ‘just a friend’ or buddy,” he said. “I think it’s difficult to find members of the community who fit the criteria and are also willing to volunteer their time.”

Also of note is a long-running lack of general public input for compensation board recommendations. While the group in Washington County held its meetings at the county courthouse and open to the public, their lack of prominent notices beforehand and after-hours meeting times have limited constituents’ awareness and media attention while salary recommendations are hashed out every winter.

While any of those could be adjusted, or addressed through other transparency measures like supervisor-run public hearings ahead of salary decisions, Seward said he worried filling the compensation board could prove increasingly difficult. The state law that dissolved the commission also requires future salary changes — whether they come from supervisors or anywhere else — to include documents that “show their work,” comparing each position to similar ones in public and private sector positions for the area.

Seward said that could be too much to ask of a compensation commission, which is filled exclusively by volunteers who, while appointed, are not paid.

“We’d have to show our work, too, but we’re sitting here paid to do it,” he said. “And we’re the ones that are ultimately responsible … My biggest thing is, we have enough trouble getting volunteers to participate.”

As it stands, Supervisors Seward and Stoops have argued in favor of moving forward without a compensation commission. Young has signaled he’d favor reinstating it, while Supervisors Marcus Fedler hasn’t argued one way or the other, but said he would favor public hearings ahead of future salary-raising votes. Supervisor Bob Yoder has offered few comments on the matter.

The state law that dissolved compensation boards on July 1 — titled Senate File 2442 — was intended to give counties more discretion over their spending, according to Sen. Dawn Driscoll, who voted in favor of it.

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“Property tax relief continues to be a priority for me and remains one of the biggest issues I hear about when talking to my constituents,” Driscoll said in an email earlier this month. “The bill we passed this year simply empowers county boards of supervisors to control their budgets and help provide the property tax relief Iowans are expecting.”

Washington County’s supervisors have been at odds with their compensation board before.

In 2021, the commission pressed decision-makers to raise all elected officials’ pay by 20% or more, ultimately succeeding despite pushback from supervisors worried about public backlash. A similar story played out the following year, with supervisors settling at 75% of the commission’s recommended pay raise in an effort to compromise.

Other counties have so far split on their decisions, based on a survey shared between Iowa’s county auditors on a closed messaging board, which was shared with The Union, showing 45 counties’ responses as of July 23.

Most respondents said their supervisors were undecided or hadn’t started discussions yet. But the majority of those who have already taken action chose to reinstate their compensation advisory groups. That list includes Monona, Shelby, Fremont, Butler, Crawford, Story, Winnebago, Calhoun, Adair, Iowa, Poweshiek, Davis, Audubon, Sac, Allamakee, and Bremer counties.

Those who have opted to keep the commissions dissolved include Cerro Gordo, Cedar, Ringgold, Keokuk, Howard, Fayette, Van Buren, and Lee, although counties that take no action before the next budget season will go without compensation boards by default, under the new law.

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com