Macon County employees are in for a treat with a new premium pay policy that will supplement their salaries for years to come. The Macon County Board of Commissioners adopted the plan at the October meeting in an effort to maximize the county’s appeal as a place to work. As for exactly what the policy means for county employees, County Manager Derek Roland says it’s all very simple.
Under the premium pay policy, workers will be provided with seven payments over the course of three and a half years, each delivered at a six-month interval, the first of which ended on Oct. 24 dated retroactively to April 26. The program is funded through the American Rescue Plan, which provided the county with a one-time payment of $6.94 million, all of which is going to premium pay. Because the county doesn’t expect this kind of extra money to be available indefinitely, the premium pay format was chosen to keep benefits coming for a long, but not permanent, period of time.
“It expires in 3.5 years,” Roland said. “Therefore, we did not want employees to become accustomed to receiving this payment as part of their bi-weekly salary.”
Premium pay is available to county employees who routinely interact with clients and co-workers in-person. This includes employees of full-time and part-time status, as well as seasonal employees who work for the entire premium pay period. However, payments will cease if the employee leaves their position early or accumulates the maximum allowance of $14,000 from the program. Roland said all existing county employees who serve in a physical space meet the criteria necessary to receive premium pay.
“The employee must have regular in-person interactions with patients, the public or coworkers while performing his or her job duties; or have regular physical handling of items that were handled by, or are to be handled by patients, the public or coworkers,” reads the premium pay policy. “The county manager has determined that all county employees who are physically at work are performing essential work and are entitled to receive such premium pay.”
While the payments will be issued in several lump sums, they will still reflect the amount of time employees have put in. An employee’s premium pay sum will be equal to a $2 per hour raise for the period in question. For example, if an employee is with the county for eight weeks before the pay period ends and works 40 hours per week, they will earn $640 for the period. However, an employee who works any length of time during a premium pay period and then leaves their position before the end of the period will get nothing for it.
“The employee must remain employed at 11:59 p.m. on the last date of each premium pay period to receive the premium pay,” reads the policy. “If the employee leaves the service of Macon County during the premium pay period, the employee is not eligible to receive any of such period’s premium pay. If there is a lapse in employment for any reason during the premium pay period, the employee is not eligible for the premium pay for that specified period.”
$6.94 million is a massive investment from the county, but Roland, the commissioners and a wide swath of county department heads agree that it’s necessary. Hiring has become a major challenge for local governments all over the country, especially in emergency response fields where help is needed the most with the ongoing pandemic. Roland said the premium pay will help Macon County compete with other local governments to fill critical positions. Just as im-portantly, it will reward the loyal employees who have kept the county running through trying times and encourage them to stick around.
“It is these men and women in the county that have got us up to where we are now in this pandemic,” Roland said. “This legislation recognizes that they’ll be the ones to take us through to the finish line.”