Link to stream council meetings, also agendas and pay & equity study
Fred: It's Morning Edition on KRPS. I'm Fred Fletcher Fierro, Joplin City Council has been hard at work this spring.
Tonight, the council will hold its sixth consecutive week of meeting at city hall. Three regularly scheduled council meetings, in addition to three special work sessions.
The special work sessions have been focused on salary increases for Joplin City employees, excluding the city's police and fire departments.
The unions that represent the police departments agreed to a new five-year contract last fall, early well, late last year.
Early this year, officials with the Union that represent the fire department in Joplin approved their five new five-year contract.
One of the individuals at the center of all of this work is Joplin's Mayor Doug Lawson, and he joins us this morning.
Good morning, mayor, and thank you for some of your time.
Mayor Lawson: Good morning. My pleasure.
Fred: The first thing that comes to mind when discussing the work sessions that have occurred throughout the whole month of April is where do you start?
Where does the story start for this?
For some, it’s last fall, when the Council was first presented with the Pay and Equity study that was created by an outside advisory group specifically for Joplin.
There is another plot point that I have heard at council meetings, and that's the 9% across the board increase that all city employees have received back in November 2020 during the pandemic.
Where do you think the salary, or the story of salary increases starts?
Where does that story start for you?
Mayor Lawson: For me, I had been on the Council not quite two years, I guess, and 2020 would be.
The best memory of mine is when salaries really came to the forefront of what we're talking about and concern for the city and the Council.
Fred: Right. And since the since that November of 2020 and that was like it seems like eons ago, doesn't it, I mean, I mean we were in the early months of the COVID pandemic, so much uncertainty and how has the story evolved for you with salary increases from November and 2020 until now, because it seems like it's evolved a lot we've, come a long way.
Mayor Lawson: We have come a long way and. You know kudos to the Finance department for going out of their way, working hard to find the best pay plans for everybody you know, and that includes police and fire.
Especially after the deaths of two officers, our focus really targeted our first responders, especially the Police Department and.
The citizens of Joplin essentially demand it.
You've got to pay them better.
So, our staff worked, worked hard with the unions of both the police and fire, and it wasn't easy.
But I think it was well worth it and.
We have given them not as much as they probably deserve.
I don't think you can ever give them as much as they deserve, considering the risk that they take, but it was substantial, and I'm pleased with what we've been able to do with our first responders.
I'm not as pleased with what we've done in the past for the other employees.
You know, they've sort of.
Been on the sideline watching us deal with the public safety and I don't think anybody minded our dealing with public safety.
It's just a matter of “hey what about me?”
Fred: When I watch City Council meetings, it's so hard to get everything you want to get across in those Council meetings, you know, with the community watching, you know, you have some people who don't agree, whichever way you decide.
Whether the pay increases are adequate enough, what is that like as mayor to sit in the middle of that and watch these discussions happen?
Mayor Lawson: Well, in a lot of ways, it's gratifying just to see like we have people in the audience that don't agree with every direction the City Council makes, but the positive is we have citizens that care.
We have citizens that pay attention, that means a lot. But we also have the citizens that do agree with some of our decisions, and that's not to say that we all agree with each other all the time.
I get nervous when nine Council members vote nine in favor, zero opposed.
Usually that makes perfectly good sense, but there's times when.
We don't want It quite quite that way.
Fred: You brought up nine to nothing votes, you get nervous.
During the special session City Manager Nick Edwards brought the salary increases up to a special vote, it was five to three, with one person absent.
So, you saw some movement, in my opinion at least because I watch other Council meetings and it seems more negative against the pay plan.
There was some movement.
Mayor Lawson: There was some movement and I've got to say that.
All nine members of the Council want to do better for the other employees.
They recognize that. Every employee makes a difference in the city of Joplin and whether it's, you know, making sure the sewers work right or the roads are functional, you know, and you can go there.
But our differences really, I think are some partly, is this quite the right way?
Do we need to tweak it a little bit more?
One Council member is concerned about sustainability, but I have confidence in the staff and our finance department when they say, yeah, I think we can do it, I think we. should go for it.
Fred: And I do want to add that the Joplin, Pay and Equity study, it's been online for months andI'll have a link for it at our website, krps.org.
Along with this interview, very in-depth, 30 or 40 slides answers a lot of details if you don't watch City Council meetings on a regular.
A problem though for middle size cities like Joplin and municipalities like Joplin, Jasper. Of course, I work in Pittsburgh and Crawford County over in Kansas when you compare the pay of Joplin to larger cities like Springfield, Columbia, MO or Bentonville, Arkansas.
Most of the time, those cities are just going to be able to pay more.
How do communities like Joplin stay competitive and retain employees in this tight, incredibly tight labor market?
Mayor Lawson: When it comes to salaries for pay, we do the best we can, but we have somewhat of a competitive advantages in the fact that it's not as expensive to live in Joplin as it is in those other cities and also Joplin's just a neat place to live.
And I think a lot of people know they could go someplace else, get substantial pay raises.
But this is home for them, right?
Fred: I also say it's just simply easier to live. If you, visit. Bentonville, Arkansas, it's insane down there. In Joplin, you can get places in 10 or 15 minutes, across the city easily.
I'm 7 minutes from everywhere in the city of Joplin,
Fred: Right.
Mayor Lawson: Which is unless I'm on Range Line. But otherwise, it's. It's a beautiful city with beautiful people.
Fred: Well, now I mean that's a good problem. I feel on Range line because a lot of the tax revenue coming off the Interstate right there and we've seen the tax revenue even in these pretty uncertain economic times still continue to increase, you know, and the city of Joplin has benefited from that.
Mayor Lawson: Yeah, we've got to see more increases than we anticipated, which is good because we rely on sales tax. That's where virtually all of our income comes from.
Fred: Joplin Mayor Doug Lawson, thank you for your time.
Mayor Lawson: You're more than welcome, thank you
Fred: It’s Morning Edition on KRPS. I'm Fred Fletcher Fierro.
