They throw money around like monopoly money at the SuperChamber with solid six figure salaries, 40(k)s, cars, perks, insurance (they asked for bonuses this year) and they do absolutely nothing except provide political commentary on everything happening everywhere. They do a fine job of recruiting nothing to Knoxville and Knox County, they are vetted by no one, they are accountable to no one, and they absence of a legitimate business and industry recruiting organization is why Knoxville and Knox County are in the economic mess with few for profit employers (other than retail) and nobody but Pilot and the bank of their choice to sponsor events in and around the community.

That's all.

Call me crazy, but the folks who took on additional job responsibilities deserved raises. Would you take on the work of two people if you weren't offered a raise?

Quit whining and eat your crumbs and gruel and be thankful you have them!!

Call me crazy, but the folks who took on additional job responsibilities deserved raises. Would you take on the work of two people if you weren't offered a raise?

Rachel, over at the KNS, I made the same observation about raises given employees Grant Rosenberg and Debra Young. I thought the article explained fully how they'd earned them (and Rosenberg's raise, as the article explained, still resulted in a salary less than what was paid to the employee whose duties he is to assume).

I thought (and said) that the article didn't explain quite as fully why raises had been given to some other employees and I conceded that I didn't know whether Knox has the ability to change the reiteration in our charter of this state law requiring "automatic" raises to the county mayor.

Of course, there's never any middle ground in the KNS comment threads and they all piled on...

Knox County Mayor to Headline 'Big Egos' Festival
Mayor Ragsdale uses next week's performance to justify pay boost

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE - Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale announced last year that administration employees would endure a salary freeze, but after records revealed his salary had increased from $148,525 to $154,321, county officials announced that the "entertainment value" Ragsdale provided to the county justified the increase...

It looks like BirdDog's and my hazy recollections on links among judges', the law director's, and the mayor's salaries were on target.

First came the September 2009 KNS story on Lockett's earlier raise, which explains that his payrate "is tied to the pay of Circuit Court and Chancery Court judges, whose salaries are set by the Legislature" and that "when the judges' salaries go up, the elected law directors' salaries go up at the same rate." KNS said then that Lockett's pay was raised from $148,524 for the 2009 fiscal year to $154,320 for 2010, here:

http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/sep/18/locketts-raises-draw-concern/

Actually, I later recalled that Mello had sent me a copy of the Private Act stipulating this pay plan some months ago, which also ran in the KNS, here:

http://web.knoxnews.com/pdf/2009/091809lawdirectorysalary.pdf

And of course Dwight posted the local charter's reiteration of instruction originating in the state's Private Act, in his link above.

Finally, we see in Scott's original post the KNS story on the mayor's recent raise, which says Ragsdale's pay has now been raised from $148,525 to $154,321 (each figure $1 higher than the law director's former and current salaries), here:

http://m.knoxnews.com/news/2010/mar/15/mayor-5-officials-get-salary-incr...

So...that's how it happened.

I said earlier...

I tend to think that if any employer hasn't made enough cuts--of whatever type--to adequately take care of the employees they'll keep, then they haven't made enough cuts.

...but of course my assumption was that the mayor's office will also be arriving at cuts of 4-8% in their department.

On just re-reading the recent KNS story Scott posted, though, I really don't see any mention of it one way or the other.

Has anyone asked, specifically, whether the mayor will make 4-8% cuts in operational and/or personnel costs in his department?

I believe that the NS made an error and transposed someone else's salary line with Rosenberg's, resulting in a significant lowballing of his salary figures.

Then what is the actual #?

Look it up yourself:

http://www.knoxnews.com/data/county-employees-pay/?appSession=4661442545...

Pretty serious fact error.

Bbeanster,

The figure I used for Grant Rosenberg's salary in the article is one I got from Human Resources Director Frances Fogerson. It is, as you noted, different from the amount listed in the database, which we didn't receive until after the article ran. I will ask Frances about the difference and either put it in another article or run a correction. As you know, the information a reporter uses is only as good as the information provided. In this case it appears the county provided inaccurate information.

In the future, please contact me or my editors if you spot a factual error in one of my articles (or any knoxnews or KNS article, for that matter). I want to make sure our readers get accurate information. I haven't been at work since Tuesday so if you have done this already, I apologize.

Scott Barker
KNS

Ragsdale sentiment notwithstanding, I wouldn't take that job for twice the salary. I doubt you'd find many CEOs in the business world heading up a $600 million operation who would.

Ragsdale sentiment notwithstanding, I wouldn't take that job for twice the salary. I doubt you'd find many CEOs in the business world heading up a $600 million operation who would.

Folks -- the mistake made here (and by Ragsdale himself) is that he's actually in charge of a $600 million operation. He's the chief fiscal officer for a county where almost $400 million goes straight to schools and other huge chunks are managed by elected officials, such as the Sheriff.

The Ragsdale-generated title "mayor" notwithstanding, the county mayor's job is really little more than a bully pulpit and management of a few folks on the 6th Floor -- and he's not done that very well. -- s.

Well, when you put it that way.

Correction on Rosenberg's salary will run tomorrow. Entirely my fault, too, so Frances is off the hook.

Scott Barker
KNS

County Commissioners have ideas for how to smallen the budget, which they'll talk about at today's meeting.

Is the sector plan with Midway going to get reviewed today, too? Could be an interesting meeting - and long.

County Mulls Shrinking Employees to Fit Smaller Budget
"Cutting the rank-and-file down to size by shrinking them 10 percent could realize vast cost savings," says administration official

From APB reports. KNOXVILLE - In a meeting today between officials of Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale's administration and Knox County Commissioners, Chief Financial Officer John Troyer recommended shrinking all employees by 10 percent to fit next year's smaller projected budget. Reactions to the proposal were generally positive, as long as the shrinkage was shared across the board...