Automatic raises cut as city puts focus on merit

Until now, municipal department heads in Woburn could count on automatic pay raises every year. Not any more.

Budget pressures, along with a belief that the city should tie salary increases to performance, have prompted city councilors to rethink how to pay the 19 people ranging from the public works director to the city clerk to the tax collector. The council took a step in this direction last week when it voted to cut raises for fiscal 2007, which begins July 1, to 1.5 percent from 3 percent.

Councilors also said they plan to form a committee to study ways in which a merit system, with an objective evaluation and review process, would operate.

Ward 2 Alderman Richard F. Gately, who filed the motion for the reduction, said he opposed pay raises that were automatic and given to department heads regardless of how they performed.

``We have some department heads who excel in their jobs and others who don't," said Gately, who declined to give names. ``I felt there was no need to reward someone with an automatic raise when they are not doing the job they should be doing."

But other councilors said they felt that the action was abrupt, considering that department managers were expecting 3 percent raises in the coming year. Alderman Scott Galvin said the department heads traditionally receive annual raises that match the increases given to the city's union employees through negotiated contracts.

``If everyone else in the city got 3 percent, I felt that it was not fair that the department heads didn't receive the same, particularly since that's the way we've done it in the past," said Galvin in an interview . ``Most of our department heads do a wonderful job. I do support a merit system in the future, however."

The issue has come to the forefront as the city government works through the budget process for next year. Mayor Thomas McLaughlin has submitted a spending plan for $102 million. Municipal spending is a sensitive issue -- several officials, including McLaughlin, won office last November with a promise to limit the kind of spending they said cause s high taxes.

A statewide report last September by the Municipal Finance Task Force, which measured trends in property tax bills between fiscal years 2000 and 2005, found that the average residential tax bill in Woburn rose 63 percent in that period , to $3,051.

Besides voting to cut annual raises for 2007, the council agreed to suspend the system that allows managers to receive additional pay increases until their salaries are comparable to what department heads in surrounding cities and towns make. Woburn started the policy in 2001.

Jan Cox, Woburn's director of human resources, said several department heads in the city had lower salaries than those in other communities. ``There was no relationship between what we were paying and the outside market," said Cox, who surveyed salaries in 25 communities.

Woburn set a target salary for different positions, based on an average of what other communities pay. It would have affected 10 of the 19 positions in 2007.

``Our goal was to establish a policy that would bring in fairness and equity," Cox said. ``We did make some progress towards that goal by using this plan, but have not fully completed the process."

For now, that policy, like the automatic raises, is in for an overhaul. Alderman Charles E. Doherty, who is the council chairman, said a new salary system would involve quarterly and year-end reviews with council members and the mayor. He said meetings to discuss what steps the city should take to move forward on this plan will be scheduled next month.

``The reality will be that the department heads will have to justify their raises," he said.

McLaughlin said the changes will mirror the private sector. ``I think it will be fairly standard to what goes on in the private sector for managers," he said. ``People would like to see some type of merit system."

Alderman Darlene Mercer-Bruen said she also supported the change, but with one caveat. ``No politics," she said. ``We should come up with objective, performance-based measures that have no politics involved."

Alexander Reid can be reached at a_reid@globe.com.