The Claiborne County Commission voted 17-4 against paying approximately $39,000 to a consulting firm for a salary study of county employees at their meeting last Monday. The study was recommended by County Finance Director Eric Pearson to see how Claiborne’s salaries compare to similar counties in Tennessee.
During discussion of the measure Pearson explained that information from the study would show which positions in the county are underpaid and how much they are underpaid by. It was asked if the county or finance department could do the study. Pearson said they didn’t have the staff and that having “experts” do the study would include surveys of department heads and over 220 employees about their concerns and ways to run each department more efficiently.
Commissioner Carolyn Brooks said the bottom line was that the commission would have to raise taxes 15 to 20 cents to get the salaries in line with other similar counties…