Portage County Executive Patty Dreier has vetoed a portion of the new salary schedule, saying it would have unintentional negative affects on some employees.

Dreier announced she is vetoing the line dealing with longevity in the new salary schedule, which was approved by the Portage County Board of Supervisors July 19 as the first of five amendments to the then-proposed salary schedule.

The County Board amended the original resolution – which eliminated longevity entirely – to include longevity in the individual’s base wage, and then at the individual’s anniversary when they reach the next step in the schedule, they would move forward two steps. The longevity amendment passed 21 to 1.

Wednesday, July 27, Dreier line-item vetoed the longevity amendment, and instead reinstituted the longevity benefit that existed prior to the salary schedule vote.

“Bottom line is the ideas presented on the floor haven’t been fully vetted; that’s what happens when you bring them to the floor and haven’t brought them to committee for more research,” she said. “I think this veto will ensure that tenured staff will continue to have the benefit they were hired under.”

The County Board will address the veto at its Aug. 16 meeting.

About 275 of the county’s roughly 600 employees qualify for longevity payments, which were approved in 2011 for those employees hired prior to Oct. 1 of that year. Years of service determines what amount the employee receives annually.

The original salary schedule presented to the County Board eliminated longevity all together, a recommendation from the county’s consultant, who spent more than a year researching, interviewing and working on the study.

Dreier said under the supervisors’ amendment, a 30-year employee who is eligible for longevity might be at the ceiling of the salary schedule, which means that employee is frozen and no longer able to see a pay increase. By re-instituting the original annual longevity benefit, that same employee would still see the annual longevity benefit.

The veto also ensures that Highway Department employees would retain the longevity benefit, Dreier said.

Under a separate amendment July 19, the County Board added the Highway Department workers to the salary schedule while also maintaining the employees’ right to negotiate. Those employees would have lost their longevity benefit if it were included in the base wage, Dreier said. The veto allows the benefit to continue to apply to those eligible workers outside of the salary schedule and in compliance with law.

Finally, she said, the veto will improve administrative efficiency when payroll and longevity comes due. The reason for the new salary schedule was in part to increase efficiency and eliminate the need to physically go into each employee’s file to ensure payments, she said. The new salary schedule would operate on a computer system that would allow eligible employees to be identified through a program and those payments made on the anniversary and annual dates determined when the employees were entered into the system.