Monday evening the Plymouth Common Council heard first reading of the ordinance setting salaries and wages for appointed officers and employees of the city for 2022. The proposal is up to a 3% increase for most employees.
In a related issue, City Councilman Jeff Houin he said there has been some confusion with the salary increase that took affect July 1st for city employees.
Plymouth Clerk Treasurer Jeanine Xaver had said during the proposal of the salary increase mid-year that she would not be seeking any additional appropriations. It had been noted council members that city department heads were being very cautious with their budgets and the additional funds needed to the pay increases would need to come from already appropriated funds on hand.
Houin said, “The budget for this year is already set and anything that had our approval of that increase in wages doesn’t change the budget. You can’t change the budget. I think the intent of that action was to use, essentially cash within that budget. But it only works if the departments are enough under the current budget to have that cash available.”
The confusion was that some though the council had increased the budget by way of an additional to cover the added funds to meet the needs of the raises.
Houin also noted that it will take special monitoring of the budgets to make sure funds are available for the wage increase through the end of the year. He said, “If any department is not able to pay the raises within the current budget then we immediately begin the additional appropriation process so that any budget constraints won’t prevent us from paying those wages to all city employees.”
Houin closed his comment saying, “I just want to make sure we are being proactive and that all of our departments are able to pay those raises.”
