CLAYTON — St. Louis County lawmakers on Tuesday fast-tracked approval of $5.1 million in federal COVID-19 recovery funds to immediately raise pay for nearly 300 frontline jail workers who have warned of dire safety concerns amid record staffing shortages.
In a rare parliamentary move, the County Council voted unanimously to suspend a two-week approval process and expedite the newly introduced bill. County Executive Sam Page immediately signed the measure into law. The Civil Service Commission, a panel that creates rules for county merit employees, is expected to meet as early as Wednesday to formalize the raises, which are expected to hit paychecks early next month.
The council also approved an appropriation of $500,000 from the county’s general fund to pay a security firm for up to 15 staff to help the jail for up to six months.
The moves followed riveting testimony to the full County Council over the past week by Acting Jail Director Scott Anders, corrections officers and jail reform advocates, who spoke about how staffing issues are affecting safety.
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On Nov. 10, an officer was badly beaten by an inmate, the second such attack since October. The jail, which currently has a daily inmate population of about 900, is short about 80 corrections officers — about 25% of the total number of positions.
The bill approved Tuesday provides a $3 per hour pay raise — above a $2 hourly increase the jail requested last week — for 297 corrections officers and case workers at the county jail through 2024.
The hourly increase raises corrections officers’ starting base pay from $18.18 an hour to $21.18 an hour. That amounts to an increase in the jail’s starting annual salary from $36,847 to $42,923.
Anders and other supporters say the pay will help with recruitment efforts and stop workers leaving for higher-paying jobs in other industries or with other jails in the region: St. Charles County, for example, pays $39,467; St. Clair County in Illinois pays $45,425.
But passage of the newly introduced pay bill Tuesday wasn’t guaranteed.
After vowing last week to move speedily, Council Chair Rita Days, D-1st District, asked the council to review the new legislation over the next few days so it could be approved next week: “I want to make sure that we have everything that is appropriate in that bill.
“We have made fits and starts before, I want to make sure that we do not make a mistake on this one,†Days said.
The council in August appropriated $1.9 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds to provide $500 lump-sum “milestone†increases for workers after each 90 days on the job. That bill was the council’s response to former jail director Doug Burris’ request for $5 million in ARPA funds to raise hourly wages, which he first made in April. At the time, the jail was down 45 officers, but Burris’ request languished for weeks as the council debated the measure.
The compromise was designed to provide incentives to keep officers from quitting. But Deloitte, the accounting firm county hired in September to review ARPA spending, recently said the lump-sum payments would be an ineligible use of the federal relief money.
The announcement Tuesday of another week’s wait frustrated corrections officers in attendance, who threatened a walkout.
“I need you all to do something — today,†Officer Martha Wheat told the council Tuesday. “Or I’m going to have all our officers to walk out, and you all might have to come over there and do corrections.â€
The Rev. Philip Duvall, a civil rights activist and member of the Justice Services Advisory Board, testified that officers were working “extremely excessive†overtime hours: “ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ won’t be able to enjoy their families for Thanksgiving.â€
After Councilwoman Lisa Clancy, D-5th District, asked to fast-track the bill, the council took up a suggestion from Councilman Mark Harder, R-7th District, to recall Anders, who had left the chamber with other corrections officers, to answer their questions.
Councilwoman Shalonda Webb, D-4th District, said she wanted to make sure the pay raise wouldn’t benefit salaried supervisors. Councilman Tim Fitch, R-3rd District, asked whether be pay raise would be enough to boost recruitment long term.
Anders vowed that the pay raise included “absolutely no salaried employees,†and he said the pay raise would ensure there would be no potential for a strike.
“We have excellent staff who are very committed to showing up for the last year-and-a-half and working in an environment that is high risk,†he said. “Increasing this pay will help us keep them here in the county.â€
Anders said the contracted security officers would be used to fill early morning shifts and assist with the transport of inmates while the jail seeks to hire new corrections officers. The jail recently began interviewing candidates for a federal apprenticeship program offering a $500 incentive and pay for some college credit coursework after six months.
“While we have staff who are being interviewed, they need to be trained,†he said.
Convention Center expansion review
The council also voted 5-2 to approve a resolution by Councilman Ernie Trakas, R-6th District, to further delay its share of financing for expansion of America’s Center in downtown St. Louis until the St. Louis Economic Development Partnership “evaluates†the plans and “alternative proposals.†That would include an 11th-hour pitch by Bob Clark of Clayco that would entirely remake the complex.
The resolution, which asks the Partnership to spend 60 days evaluating the proposals and report to the council, is nonbinding. A spokeswoman for the Partnership did not respond to a request for comment.
The move was a response to an “open letter†from Kitty Ratcliffe, president of the St. Louis Convention and Visitors Commission, who said the county’s delay had pushed back construction by three months and might force the cancellation of a major convention in September 2023 that could bring in an estimated $15.4 million for the region.
Days has for months delayed a final vote on issuing $100 million in bonds for the project until securing further commitment from the CVC for a recreation facility in north St. Louis county.
The two projects were tied together in a deal negotiated in April 2019 by Ratcliffe and Days’ predecessor, then-Councilwoman Hazel Erby, D-1st District, that directed that 35% of the county’s “excess†hotel-motel tax revenue — that is, revenue not already encumbered by other project to the proposed rec center.
But there won’t be money for the project for three years, and Ratcliffe has insisted the CVC can only help pay for a project, not design or build it.
Trakas said he wanted the study “to know, if we issue the authority to fund this project, that it has a chance to succeed.â€
Harder, Fitch, Days, and Webb supported the resolution. Clancy and Councilwoman Kelli Dunaway, D-2nd District, voted against it.