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Town officials this month discussed what they described as an ongoing salary issue among New Canaan’s finest.
During the Ag. 6 meeting of the Board of Selectmen, members of the Police Commission asked the selectmen for percentage salary increases for the highest-ranking members of the New Canaan Police Department.
Paul Foley, a member of the appointed body, asked the Board to increase the deputy chief and captain’s salary from 2.75% to 3%, and the chief’s from 2.75% to 3.5%.
During the meeting, held in Town Hall and via videoconference, Foley said these increases aren’t “quite where other departments are, but it gets them bumped up a bit.”
Foley said the increases would send a message to the rest of the staff that “there is some room for compensation increase.”
Foley said the department has been dealing with an issue where there’s a lack of individuals moving into administration positions. Many members of the police force elect to stay in officer, sergeant and lieutenant positions in order to work overtime, as often they can make “substantially more” money than those working in administration, he said.
In providing compensation increases, Foley said that the Police Commission is trying to incentivize others within NCPD to take the sergeant and lieutenant exams “so that they can move up professionally as well as in compensation.”
Selectman Steve Karl asked the Police Commission if there were other ways to encourage officers to move into administrative positions apart from raising salaries.
Foley said, “There isn’t, not that we have been able to come up with. This is certainly a topic that the Commission talks about regularly because we are concerned about it. We’ve got great people up and down the department and when you’re running any organization you want to keep them.”
Karl floated the idea of dedicating a “percentage of the overtime” so that it “flows into an account for the administrative side, even if it’s 2-3%, where you could start a fund and give these guys a piece of something else that’s going on out there.”
Foley and the selectmen agreed that was a good thought.
Selectmen Amy Murphy Carroll asked Foley for background information on how the salary of New Canaan’s police force compares with that of similar towns.
Foley said, “We review local towns by size and we look at the larger towns as well because people can move every day to another town so we just want to be aware of what those numbers are.”
Human Resources Director Cheryl Pickering Jones added, “We met with the career staff and looked at all of the area towns. We are low compared to Darien, we are high compared to some others. As Paul said, we did a look at all of Fairfield County … we felt that the numbers that the Commission had initially come in with were a little high. We asked them to go back and now they have come forward with a different increase which we were comfortable with.”
Murphy Caroll asked where the increases would come from within the town’s budget.
Foley said, “We will go through line item by line item. We’re talking a few thousand dollars here.”
Murphy Carroll asked if salaries were evaluated every year.
Foley replied, “Yes, we want to make sure we aren’t losing good people to other towns or other states, and we want to be competitive. We take a look at it regularly – annually.”
Pickering Jones and Foley agreed they would put together a packet to provide exact numbers for the selectmen at their next meeting.