City manager: New step pay plan will help Joplin recruit experienced police officers

(From the City of Joplin)

Effective August 4, the City of Joplin has adopted a new step plan for city employees. The plan was approved by the City Council on July 16, 2018 to address some concerns brought forth by City Manager Sam Anselm about the current pay system.

Under the new plan, existing employees are placed into their pay range based on the time spent in their positions. For example, prior to the adoption of the step plan, a police officer with nearly five years of service was making the same hourly rate as an employee who was hired within the past year. Now, that same police officer has received a 7.6% pay increase to recognize his service to the community.

“I’d like to thank the City Council for taking the unusual step of adopting a new plan mid-year to address the deficiencies with our previous plan,” said City Manager Sam Anselm. “The primary benefit of adopting a new step plan is that it recognizes our existing employees and their contributions to the city in their current roles.”

Combined with a 3% increase given in 2016 and a 2% increase in 2017, the new step plan grants an average 3.4% raise to all city employees, for a total average increase of 8.4% for employees in the last 20 months. The results of the pay plan vary for each employee, but to illustrate the overall impact, public safety employees will see the following changes with their next paycheck.

“In addition to recognizing the service of our existing employees, and understanding that we face a shortage of officers in our police department, this new plan will give the command staff greater flexibility to recruit experienced police officers to come serve our community. Prior to adopting the new plan, it was difficult to recruit officers with experience to come work for the city who might have been making more than officers we’ve had for three or four years. With the adoption of the new plan, that barrier is removed, which will hopefully result in getting back to full staff sooner rather than later,” says Anselm.

Those interested in a position with our Joplin Police Department, or other positions with the city, can visit www.joplinmo.org/jobs to apply.