The move establishes a baseline salary for county elected offices, which is will now be about $120,000. That’s what the county assessor, auditor, surveyor, recorder, and treasurer will be paid. Those officials were previously paid about $90,000.
The county sheriff and attorney will be paid 130% and 145%, respectively, of that new baseline salary. County council members will be paid 33% of the baseline.
While the position of county manager is not an elected one, it will receive a bump as well — from about $157,000 to $202,000.
County Manager Dustin Grabau said he expressed concern to the council about that raise. But it was based on the recommendation of an independent consultant who looked at other "professional manager" positions in "similar entities."
"I think the council felt like this type of compensation was fair," he said.
For comparison, Summit County Manager Shayne Scott makes $205,000.
Grabau said the pay increases are part of a larger effort to overhaul the compensation structure for all county employees.
"Wasatch County is moving from previously, a very loose, ill-defined compensation model," he said. The new, "much more rigid" model will will have 26 pay grades, he said.
Grabau said that, under the previous system, the county would assess the market for each individual job vacancy, and would then adjust other salaries based on what they found.
As a result, "people who had been working here longer were making similar amounts as people who have been working with less experience," he said.
The consultant found that about 60% of county jobs were being paid below market value, Grabau said, and the county will be making adjustments to those wages as well.
"I know personally several staff that are struggling with the cost of living that we're providing," he said. "Some of those positions are the ones that are seeing pretty significant percentage increases. And I'm excited to be able to be more fair and what we're offering them."
Grabau said offering those raises is consistent with county government's "very sacred responsibility" to appropriately manage taxpayer dollars.
"At the end of the day, we need firefighters, we need police officers. We need people to do our property taxes and process our driver's licenses," he said. "All of these things are essential services. And we need quality people doing those jobs."
The pay adjustments for the county’s elected officials will be effective July 15.
