Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

On split vote, county commissioners take 2 percent pay cut

Commissioners delay vote on pay cut for non-union county employees

Larry Brown

Larry Brown

Steve Sisolak

Steve Sisolak

Clark County commissioners voted to cut their own salaries 2 percent but delayed a decision on cutting non-union employee wages.

Commissioners spent more than an hour of their nine-hour meeting Tuesday discussing the two actions, neither of which appeared to have unanimous support.

Commissioners Steve Sisolak and Larry Brown proposed the 2 percent wage reduction for the commissioners, saying they needed to lead by example when asking their employees to take similar cuts.

“I don’t like giving pay cuts to anyone, but unfortunately its something we have to do,” Sisolak said.

Commissioner Tom Collins said he didn’t think the board had the legal authority to cut its own wages because the state Legislature sets limits on county commission salaries.

The county’s legal council disagreed, saying state law only limits the maximum raises commissioners can give themselves.

Commissioners Lawrence Weekly and Chris Giunchigliani said they didn’t think the board should force the wage reductions and commissioners should individually volunteer to give back part of their pay instead.

Weekly said it is the people he represents who put him on the commission. “I don’t need any of you take anything away from me, because you didn’t give it and you can’t take it and that’s why my vote was the way it was,” he said.

Despite her voiced concerns, when it came time to vote, Giunchigliani sided with the majority, giving a 5-2 approval for the pay cut.

But the commissioners were even more divided on the proposed pay cut to county employees who are not part of collective bargaining units.

County Manager Don Burnette proposed a 2 percent across-the-board cut to all non-union employees at the county, University Medical Center and Clark County Water Reclamation District.

The cut would save the county nearly $1.3 million in the next year and impact about 1,500 employees, Burnette said.

“I’ll be the first person to acknowledge this 2 percent wage decrease does not solve our budget problem,” Burnette said. “It does, however, provide immediate relief to a strained budget and obviously there is more work to be done as it relates to reducing our wage and benefit structure and saving scarce county tax dollars and addressing the budget problem that we all face.”

Still, about 70 percent of the employees would receive a 4 percent merit pay increase in a few months.

Burnette said the 2 percent cut saves more than just freezing wages and taking away the 4 percent increase, and the plan benefits people who are paid less, because only employees who have not hit the top of their pay range would get the merit increase.

Just the same, Sisolak said he would not support a proposal that gives people more money when the economy is bad.

“I just can’t support people getting a raise, which I think is what 70 percent of the people you’re telling me are still going to get in this economy,” he said. “That’s my 2 cents. I can’t support it.”

The proposal to cut non-union employees’ wages was prepared before the county’s largest union, the SEIU, agreed to a tentative contract for the next year. That contract calls for a 2 percent wage cut to union employees but is still subject to approval from the union members and commissioners.

Brown asked that a decision on the cut for non-union employees be delayed until after the union approves the contract, so commissioners can consider both cuts together, hopefully at their meeting April 5.

Burnette said the cuts are an immediate measure to help balance the budget and as soon as the union contract is approved, the county will begin negotiations on the next contract, which may include more cuts and changes to benefits and longevity pay.

“The 2 percent is not all that we would hope for, but we’re happy to at least be able to present it to you today and then let you know that we need to keep going further,” Burnette said. “There are more improvements that we need to make, and assuming we get this item behind us...and the membership ratifies the contract and the board approves it, we’re going to go right back into bargaining, and I think we need to pick up where we left off.”

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