Roughly 300 to 400 employees in the city of Mobile’s Public Works Department are currently ineligible for a $500 employee-of-the-month bonus available to workers in other departments, members of the Mobile City Council learned during a pre-conference meeting held Tuesday.
City Attorney Ricardo Woods told the council that workers in the department’s public services division cannot receive the bonus because they already receive payments the state of Alabama classifies as bonuses through a separate incentive program. That program was created by Mayor Sandy Stimpson’s administration after months of employee complaints about harassment and working conditions on the job. Because state law caps the total amount of bonus money a single employee can receive in a given period, workers already collecting incentive pay have effectively been locked out of the citywide recognition bonus.
The incentive program has been a point of friction between the council and the mayor’s office for roughly two years. The council amended the fiscal year 2019 budget to include raises for public works employees, but the administration instead rolled out a system that lets workers boost their pay based on attendance, working conditions and whether they hold a commercial driver’s license. Some council members have long argued that approach treats public works employees differently than workers in every other city department, and that frustration resurfaced during Tuesday’s discussion.
“I don’t think it’s legal to treat employees differently,” Councilman Fred Richardson said. “Treat them all the same.”
Councilwoman Gina Gregory noted that the incentive program was put in place instead of the raises the council had approved, while employees in other departments receive the employee-of-the-month bonus on top of their regular salary.
“I think that’s where we’re having trouble with this,” Gregory said. “The incentives should not be counted against them.”
Executive Director of Public Works Jim DeLapp told the council the administration is working to resolve the conflict by folding the incentive pay each employee has already earned into their base salary going forward. Several council members pointed out that doing so would essentially amount to the raises they requested roughly two years ago, just delayed.
“Basically you’re agreeing with the council, but just a couple of years later,” Councilwoman Bess Rich said.
DeLapp said the adjustment would not apply evenly across the entire department. Instead, it would be based on the specific incentives each employee has already earned. The incentive program has three tiers: a $25 payment for showing up to a scheduled shift, a 2.5 percent pay increase for drivers who obtain a commercial driver’s license, and another 2.5 percent increase for employees who work in open-cab equipment.
Richardson, who is running against Stimpson in this year’s mayoral race, argued that the incentive structure forces public services employees to clear extra hurdles that other city workers seeking raises don’t face, calling the arrangement “absolutely absurd.”
“It has been time to cut this foolishness out,” he said.
During his remarks later in the meeting, Stimpson outlined plans for a scaled-back Carnival season on Mardi Gras day. Acknowledging that residents will still want to gather on Dauphin Street, the mayor said the city plans to block off adjacent streets so revelers can celebrate while maintaining social distancing.
Stimpson also pointed to some of the alternative ways residents have marked the holiday season this year, including neighborhood porch parades known as Yardi Gras. In that spirit, he said the city will decorate Mardi Gras Park, sometimes called the city’s front yard, with Carnival decorations supplied by Bellingrath Gardens. Steve Joynt of Mobile Mask magazine originated the porch-parade concept.
Seven Mardi Gras parading societies have contacted the city and received permission to bring floats to Mardi Gras Park for stationary public display, though not for parading, Stimpson said. The city has also directed organizations interested in hosting private street parties to apply for the necessary permits.
In other business, the council postponed a vote on a proposed animal tethering ordinance to allow time to consider a batch of changes suggested by residents during the meeting. One proposed revision would raise the minimum outdoor temperature at which an animal may be tethered from 20 degrees to 32 degrees, after three residents spoke on the issue. Residents and council members also expressed interest in raising the fine for leaving an animal tethered for more than 30 minutes, though Council Attorney Chris Arledge noted that the fine schedule is governed by a separate ordinance.
Richardson, who introduced the tethering proposal, said he remains satisfied with it despite the delay.
“This is not a perfect ordinance, but what we’re trying to do is get dogs off chains,” he said. “We can always come back and amend it if it turns out it’s so weak nobody is paying attention to us.”
District 5 Councilman Joel Daves agreed that no ordinance would be perfect but said the council should move forward.
“We can parse this from now until hell freezes over, but there’s not a perfect ordinance,” Daves said. “What we need to do is take our best shot right now. This is a great first step.”