Seniors passed over for raises
BOISE – Idaho lawmakers heard testimony regarding a pay discrepancy at the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, where an employee alleges she did not receive a raise because she’s too old.
“They want to keep the young people, but I don’t think it should be at the expense of the older people,” said Sherry Mattox, 57, who will retire in 20 months. The Senate and House Changes in Employee Compensation Committee meets yearly to hear reports from agencies and grievances from state workers. Issues of inequitable raises at Health and Welfare arose several times throughout Friday’s daylong meeting.
Committee co-chairman Rep. Bob Schaefer, R-Nampa, said he received more than 60 letters from unhappy Health and Welfare workers.
Some employees there were denied a 2 percent raise promised in the last legislative session. The House-Senate human resource panel endorsed the pay increase for state workers last year, thawing a two-year pay freeze forced by the budget crisis.
The state directed agencies to give raises to employees who earned satisfactory performance evaluations, but some employees with passing evaluations were passed over for the raise.
Diana Jansen, the department’s human resources administrator, said the raise was divvied up to bring some wages up to a fairer level. Those passed over were so because “their supervisor felt they were paid for their performance and they were at the salary commensurate with their positions,” Jansen told the legislators.
She said less than 10 percent of the more than 2,800 employees with satisfactory evaluations were passed over, and she was sure no one supervisor was responsible.
Mattox said she is the most senior person in the office and is now the lowest paid. She said that despite being rewarded several times for exceptional work, younger workers at the department got 5 percent raises and she didn’t.
A memo sent to Mattox and other employees who were denied the raise said: “Other factors taken into account were expectations of exceptional future performance, exceptional productivity, effectiveness, reliability, teamwork, dedication to continuous quality improvement.”
It’s “a nice way of saying, ‘you’re a little too old,’ ” said Rep. Shirley Ringo, D-Moscow. “I think the scenario suggests there is a person at the top who dictated their policy.”
Mattox told legislators that Health and Welfare Director Karl B. Kurtz, a governor appointee, passed the salary guidelines down to supervisors.
“I know of nothing that should have prevented me from getting a raise,” she told the legislators. “I don’t want to create problems. I just want to do my job, do it well and be valued and respected.”
She told of three others in her office – all over 50 – who didn’t get the raise.
Lawmakers told Mattox they were outraged by her testimony and promised to follow up.
Legislators also heard from Idaho State Division of Human Resources Director Ann Heilman, who recommended state agencies be given a 6.7 percent increase for raises. She suggested registered nurses be given a permanent 10 percent increase and all other state workers be given a one-time 3 percent increase, as a bonus.