The financial woes being experienced across the country are not being felt as strongly by the Perry County Fiscal Court as they voted to approve a 50 cent pay raise during a special called meeting on Tuesday morning. Judge-Executive Denny Ray Noble said the county is in good financial shape right now and the court thought the raise was only fair since the price of everything else is rising.
“Due to the rising cost of gas prices and the cost of living we feel like that these people need a raise. Our people do a great job and the county is in good financial shape now. When I came in it was broke, but now we are in real good shape. I think it is only fair that these people get this due to the high cost of gas,” he said.
He said because it was costing employees more to get to work they had considered going to a four day work week, but that would knock out service to people in the county and due to the carry over in the budget the past two years the court felt like it could give a raise to help offset some of those rising costs for its employees.
“We feel like the gas prices are so high, it is costing workers so much more to get to work. We had a carry over the last two years in our budget and we feel like our workers deserve a raise to make up for the gas costs,” Noble said.
This wasn’t the case when he took office as judge though as the county was $6.4 million in debt, he said. However, in their last budget they carried over $1.5 million.
“We feel like our people work hard and we feel like they deserve a raise and the whole fiscal court feels the same way. I talked to the fiscal court before we had this meeting today and we all agree that our workers need a raise,” he said. “People are struggling all over due to the cost of gas. When the cost of gas goes up, the cost of food and everything else goes up. We realize that and we want to take care of the people that take care of us.”
The money for the raise will come out of the county budget and he thinks employees will be happy with it.
“We did the same thing at the Ambulance Service. We gave them a 50 cent raise to help with fuel costs,” Noble said.
During the meeting he also recommended that the clerk and sheriffs offices do the same for their employees.
Noble said, “We set their budget and we will let the clerk take it out of their excess fees and we will try to help the sheriff with his people.”
The raise is effective immediately.
In other business the court approved the annual salary of the County Treasurer at $43,641.63 and the Emergency Management Director at $47,756.52. The court also looked at bids for a new ambulance. They decided to get a recommendation from the Ambulance Board before they made their choice.
Fiscal Court meetings are held the third Tuesday of each month at 10 a.m. in the Perry County Fiscal Court Room in the old courthouse.
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