Latest news with #staffpay
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Bumps for ETSU salaries OK'd at trustee meeting
JOHNSON CITY, Tenn. (WJHL) — East Tennessee State University trustees approved salary increases for hundreds of staff on Friday, following similar raises for faculty a few months earlier. The adjustments were made due to efficiencies and market studies showing pay levels are below national standards. The university said the funds became available in the most recent spring 2025 semester after selected positions were left unfilled and operational efficiencies were identified during the annual Budget Model Update process. After a study on faculty salaries, the Budget Model Update determined said salaries were below the market targets. In addition, the data showed ETSU has lagged behind institutional peers in faculty and staff salaries. The average faculty salary of ETSU's institutional peers was $80,518, while the average faculty salary was $71,618. For staff, the peer average was $61,335, while ETSU's staff average was $52,144. Johnson City Commission votes to donate police car to N.C., approves ETSU Ashe Street lease Of the 639 regular faculty members (excluding those in the College of Medicine, College of Pharmacy, Family Medicine and adjunct faculty), Human Resources identified 388 who were below market targets. On Friday, 599 staff members whose salaries are below the market range received emails notifying them that their salaries will be increased. This represents 37% of ETSU's staff (including the College of Medicine, College of Pharmacy, and Family Medicine) and 60% of the faculty. Any salary increases provided will be retroactive to Nov. 1, 2024, or the date of hire, whichever is most recent. The total outlay of the faculty raises in March was $1.6 million. To fund the first round of these enhancements, ETSU identified $2 million through vacancy management (select positions being unfilled) and other institutional efficiencies as a result of the Budget Model Update process. ETSU trustees to consider 5% tuition/fee hike While the university does not have the means to close market gaps in a year, the pay increase means it has acknowledged the competitive rates. ETSU said it is working to close the margin even more. With financial positions and enrollment numbers still strong, the gap will be closed through the ongoing vacancy management analysis, which will identify positions not being filled. Lori Erikson, assistant vice president for ETSU Human Resources, said living costs have helped navigate and maintain university funds. 'ETSU's salaries have trailed those of peer institutions; however, our region's low cost of living helped us remain competitive,' she said. 'In recent years, as the cost of living has risen significantly, the university has made salary enhancements a priority to ensure we continue attracting and retaining top-tier faculty and staff.' ETSU said it appreciates the Board of Trustees' support and leadership. 'Their commitment to the university's mission and to the success of our faculty and staff has been instrumental in making these salary enhancements possible,' the university said. Friday's meeting also included the final approval of a 5% hike in undergraduate tuition and fees for the coming academic year and information about the university's upcoming lease of the historic Ashe Street Courthouse from the City of Johnson City. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
BBC News
22-05-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Somerset Council to bring in consultants for pay structure review
A council said it will spend £3m on external consultants to review the pay structure of its Democrat-run Somerset Council said it was "high time" a pay and grading review was carried out for its more than 4,000 full time staff and a new system was launched from April the council formed by uniting five local authorities in 2023, it inherited different sets of payment structures for its councillor Theo Butt-Philip said: "It's highly likely that in a number of areas we will see staff being paid more. It is possible that there will be some staff who see their pay reduced but I very much hope that won't be the case." 'Fairly paid' A council report said the normal expectation following a pay and grading review is that some roles will increase in pay, some will remain the same, and some will decrease in pay and be subject to contractual pay Butt-Philip said it was "always going to be necessary" to do a full pay and grading review after the local councils united."It's high time the whole thing was reviewed. Morally it's right that we ensure we are paying our staff fairly," he said."We know there's a few roles we are finding it hard to recruit to and we know one of the drivers is we are just not paying the right amount by market standards." He added the price for the consultants was budgeted for by the council."It's an enormous amount of work," said Mr Butt-Philip. "It will take over a year to conduct it, the figure we budgeted for is based on how much it has cost for other similar authorities to undergo this work."Somerset Council declared a 'financial emergency' in November 2023 and had to find £100m of savings and cuts to balance its budget for 2024/ December 2024, the government announced £607.9 million funding for the council for 2025, which was a 5.6% increase on the year at the time, the local authority said it is not enough to fill gaps in its funding, and services outside of adult and social care could still be lost.
Irish Times
20-05-2025
- Health
- Irish Times
Replace secure special care units with one ‘centre of excellence', Tusla told
Tusla should replace its three special care detention units with a single 'centre of excellence campus' as part of a bid to overcome severe challenges within the area, an external review group has advised. The centre, as well as improvements to staff pay and conditions, are among 30 recommendations made in the review, which was commissioned by the Tusla child and family agency amid 'critical' bed shortages in the special care facilities. Children at risk of serious harm can be detained for their safety on foot of a High Court order in one of the State's special care units. Due to a lack of staff, just 14 of 26 special care beds in the three facilities across the State's three special care units are open, a statistic that has been repeatedly criticised by judges. The placement shortage has left children deemed to be at serious risk of harm living in unregulated emergency accommodation for a time. READ MORE Rather than maintaining the three existing special care centres, the review group recommends a single campus featuring units with 'graduated security levels'. The proposed centre of excellence should be a 'state-of-the-art' purpose-built facility, supported by a multidisciplinary staff team, shared services and research capacity, it said. Noting challenges with each existing centre, it said none have the physical infrastructure to support a centre-of-excellence model. There are significant limitations around accommodation and staff capacity. The three existing centres, Ballydowd and Crannóg Nua in Dublin and Coovagh House in Limerick, require ongoing and 'considerable' investment, the review group said, noting that in Ballydowd, some bedroom windows cannot be opened to access fresh air. In Crannóg Nua, it noted children are admitted through an enclosed garage, which it said is 'concerning'. 'Put plain and simple, the current build environment supplying special care beds is not fit for purpose,' the review states. Separately, it found Tusla's special care provision has become 'unfocused' and has 'drifted' from its intended purpose as a short-term intervention. Instead, it has become a 'de facto placement option', in which some children have been detained for up to two years. This shift is largely due to insufficient onward placements and a lack of community-based resources for discharge-ready children, it found. An earlier practice whereby an onward placement would be identified as part of the application process 'appears to no longer be functioning', it said. The review group recommended aligning remuneration with comparable roles at the Oberstown Children Detention Campus A lack of suitable onward placements alongside insufficient staffing, which emerged as a 'critical challenge', is resulting in under-occupancy, with just under half of the available beds not in use. The review notes that while 168 staff have been hired since 2021, 174 staff have left the service in the same period. Exposure to violence, harassment and aggression were identified as key issues affecting staff who leave the service. Rolling and targeted recruitment campaigns have not yielded meaningful numbers of eligible applicants, 'and there is no indication that this situation will change in the short to medium term', the review notes. Staff absenteeism, meanwhile, is 'significantly high' at 20 per cent in both 2022 and 2023, with the review group noting that usual anticipated levels of absenteeism in the public services range from three per cent to five per cent. [ Government to change law in bid to speed up autism and disability assessments Opens in new window ] [ Even Claire Byrne is alarmed by what she hears about life for Irish teenagers Opens in new window ] The review group recommended aligning remuneration with comparable roles at the Oberstown Children Detention Campus to address recruitment and retention issues. It noted that pay scales for those working in the youth detention and remand facility are 'substantially higher'. Other recommendations to target staffing issues include more psychological support, the use of 'safety pods' and a review of the terms of employment and rosters to make the role more attractive. The report presents 30 recommendations across capacity, governance, staffing, care models and funding. It proposed implementation over three years. Although this is an 'ambitious' timeline, the review group said it is 'necessary to transition from crisis management to systematic service delivery'. 'Success depends on sustained Government commitment, adequate resources and effective inter-agency collaboration to ensure vulnerable children receive appropriate support,' the report says.
