More $$$ For City Employees?
BOBBY ARDOIN
Editor/Consulting Writer
The Opelousas Board of Aldermen could decide during a regular August meeting whether to implement annual pay raises which would affect all municipal employees
At this point most city workers, according to a Tuesday night Budget Committee decision, are scheduled to receive a $1 per hour annual raise. Firefighters would get a $2.50 per-hour increase. Police officers would be given $3.50.
City Accountant Lawanda St. Ann indicated that if approved, the raises would be implemented Sept. 1 and cost about $488,283.
Those raises would be added to the annual 2.5 percent employees’ cost of living increases that have been provided by the city for over a decade.
The potential budgetary victim if the raises are granted, could be the proposed North City Park walking trail.
St. Ann estimated that the city might eventually have to spend $276,000 in order to fulfill matching fund costs in order to receive a National Parks Service grant, whose deadline is scheduled for mid-August.
Alderwoman Delita Broussard had asked the city in 2023 to seek the grant funding needed for the half mile trail. The Board agreed to request the federal funding.
Broussard did not attend the Tuesday Budget Committee meeting or the regular meeting held in July.
Before voting at the Tuesday meeting, the Committee discussed two other employee raise options that would cost the city more.
St. Ann was presented by some committee members with the possibility of offering workers as much as $1.25 or $1.50 per hour more than they now receive.
Due to the overall costs that would involve employee retirements and ancillary expenses incurred by the city, St. Ann recommended providing the $1 per hour raise rather than the $1.25 or $1.50
Opelousas Mayor Julius Alsandor told the Committee the city is committed to improving the salaries of all employees, but he said that funding for that is not currently available.
“We are doing what we can do at this time and what we can sustain going forward,” Alsandor said.
Committee member John Guilbeaux said there is a chance more money will become available as the budgetary year proceeds so city workers could receive higher increases.
