Knox County Mayor Betsy Henderson is asking Knox County commissioners to exempt themselves and school board members from the6% raises awarded this summer to all county employees, according to new agenda documents.
Commissioners are set to discuss the proposal Sept. 28, and Henderson said she'll put it on each commission agenda until it passes. Henderson lambasted the raises when they were passed back in June, when she was the Republican nominee for mayor and a Knox County Schools board member.
"All the Democrats and many of the Republicans on the Knox County Commission voted to increase pay for themselves and other elected officials while reducing the Knox County Schools budget by $4 million," Henderson wrote on Facebook on July 23.
If commissioners
voted to cancel the raises for themselves and school board members, it would return $30,000 back into the county's budget through the end of this fiscal year. The raises amounted to $1,921.87 per person per month, including benefits.
Six of the 11 members must support the proposal for it to pass. Five members who supported the raises remain on the commission: Democrats Courtney Durrett, Shane Jackson and Damon Rawls and Republicans Terry Hill and Adam Thompson.
“I promised that I would add a motion to repeal the 6% pay increase given to the Knox County Commission and School Board to the commission’s agenda for every meeting until it passed," Henderson exclusively told Knox News on Sept. 9. "I look forward to the commissions swift action in passing this resolution, and I thank them for their continued hard work.”
Commissioners and school board members were automatically lumped in with all county employees who received raises, which excluded KCS employees. Commissioners who supported the pay increases said they wanted to help county workers and sheriff's deputies keep up with rising costs.
The decision caused friction between the commission and the school board. County employees already were scheduled to receive 3% cost of living raises starting July 1 under former Mayor Glenn Jacobs, but former commission chair Gina Oster successfully proposed doubling them – and that meant taking $4 million from the school district budget.
Evan Newman, Henderson's chief of staff, told Knox News the mayor's plan is for commissioners' raises to get put back into the KCS budget.
The $13,305 from eliminating school board members' raises would go directly toward KCS, but she'll have to separately ask the commission to move the $16,262 from its raises to the KCS budget.
Henderson's proposal can't affect the raises of county employees or of other elected officers, such as her, the trustee, property assessor, register of deeds and sheriff. Those officers' salaries are set by the state, not the commission or mayor.
Henderson and the other independently elected officials got 2.6% cost of living wages this year, Knox County Chief Finance Officer Chris Caldwell said.
Allie Feinberg is the politics reporter for Knox News. Email: allie.feinberg@knoxnews.com; Reddit: u/KnoxNewsAllie
This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Mayor Betsy Henderson tells commissioners to block their pay raises | Exclusive
