Kansas City Council directs city manager to look at pay of all city employees

A resolution passed Thursday by the Kansas City Council directs the city manager to review the salaries of city employees to ensure fair pay.

During Thursday’s meeting, Councilwoman Katheryn Shields, 4th District at-large, said the resolution turns attention to a salary study that was completed last year at the beginning of the pandemic. It allows City Manager Brian Platt to see if the study needs to be updated and to return with recommendations.

“We have a good workforce and we will only keep that workforce, particularly in line with so many early retirements, and try to retain, if we are offering competitive salaries,” Shields said.

Mayor Quinton Lucas, who sponsored the resolution, posted on Twitter that he was glad to see the council “support salary increases for our City employees. #PayThePeople.”

Glad to see us moving ahead today with Council support on administrative work that will support salary increases for our City employees. #PayThePeople

— Mayor Q (@QuintonLucasKC) August 5, 2021

The resolution passed unanimously, with Councilwoman Heather Hall, 1st District, absent from the meeting.

Jane Brown, general counsel to the mayor, said during Wednesday’s Finance, Governance and Public Safety Committee, that it’s important the city compensate its employees fairly.

“If we don’t, it results in high employee turnover, higher vacancies, low morale and increased training costs,” Brown said.

In that meeting, committee members also discussed amending the code of ordinances by moving up the timeline for a new minimum wage of $15 an hour for city employees. That resolution was held for a week.

The salary resolution directs department directors to work with Platt on analyzing the budget and spending to find other ways to save money to allow pay raises.

Platt is to provide a written report back to the council within 30 days.