Brittany Kelley
SAN MARCOS — The Hays County Commissioners Court continued its discussion on the upcoming fiscal year at its Aug. 11 meeting.
Human Resources director Eric Granjeno began the budget workshop by presenting on a salary study conducted. He noted that competitive and fair wages are part of the strategic plan, but that the study revealed that 14 full-time equivalent (FTE) civilian employees, or 1.81%, are aligned with the market average, while 691 FTEs, or 84.7%, are below market. There are 112 FTEs, 13.49%, over market.
Based on Massachusetts Institute of Technology data, the living wage in Hays County is $25.93 per hour for two working adults with two children. The living wage for one adult without children is $22.59 per hour, as determined by the data. This same data is what the city of Austin used recently when determining increases for its employees, said Granjeno. Hays County’s minimum wage is currently $16.32 per hour, or $33,949 annually, making 364 employees, or 45% of the civilian employees, below the suggested threshold.
There are two recommendations to accommodate this:
Option 1: Full market alignment at $6,490,419
• A 14.62% upward adjustment to the existing salary structure
• County starting wage of $45,760 or $22 an hour, raising all employees below living wage to this value.
• Employees over the range in their new proposed pay grade will receive a one-time payment Oct. 1 equivalent to 3% of their current salary
• No employees will receive less than 3% market adjustment
• No step movement in fiscal year (FY) 2027
• No regrades
Option 2: Phased full market alignment at $4,874,868
• Option 1 broken into two phases
- Phase 1: Employee salaries will per raised to 50% of their market adjustment Oct. 1
- Phase 2: Employee salaries raised to the remaining 50% of their market adjustment April 1, 2027
• No step movement in FY 2027
• No regrades
Regarding the elected positions, five were aligned with market average, eight are above and 46 are below.
There are two options for this, as well. A full market alignment, which will provide $11,688.35 in savings, due to elected officials, who are at a higher pay than the new incoming officials, leaving. It would allow elected officials who are reelected to be eligible for a 12% term increase. The second is a full market alignment or 3% cost of living adjustment (COLA) for $57,512. If anyone is not getting a market adjustment, they would get a 3% COLA. Both would commence Jan. 1, 2027.
Human Resources recommended continuing with the county’s wellness and non-wellness premium structure for the upcoming year. It also recommended increasing vacation accrual to seven hours per month and removing the six-month waiting period prior to using it.
Scott Woodland, budget officer, discussed a potential tax increase from $0.3999 to $0.4099. He shared that because the home value decreased to $450,956 the average homeowner would pay $1,803.37, which is $52.61 in savings. under the current rate. With a $0.01 increase to the tax rate, the homeowner would pay $1848.47 or $7.51 less than last year.
Next, several departments proposed requests to the court.
Hays County Sheriff Anthony Hipolito read a letter from an employee that submitted a resignation for one reason — money.
“At some point, we have to look hard at taking care of our employees,” said Hipolito.
Hays County Sheriff’s Office Chief Deputy Brett Bailey continued on this idea, stating that when they lose an employee, they lose institutional knowledge and money spent training them, increasing overtime and burden on the employees who remain. HCSO hopes to have an assigned deputy to every school in the county by 2028, but it cannot achieve this, if they cannot raise their retention rate.
Bailey also asked the court to reconsider lowering the inmates housed at other facilities. He shared that the jail population management is a system and would ask the court to instead allow flexibility that will make the most operational and financial sense.
Finally, he discussed the Axon artificial intelligence (AI) package requested.
“I understand AI is a hot topic, but Axon is offering a 10-year agreement that would lock in the AI services they currently provide and include new AI services they introduce during that 10-year period at no additional cost,” said Bailey, who had a live demonstration of the AI, where a woman speaking Spanish asked for help and an officer was able to use a translation tool to speak with her.
“I understand the recommended budget is slim. I’m not asking you to fund every request made by the sheriff’s office; I’m asking you to look at these requests through the lens of what they accomplish for the citizens of Hays County,” concluded Bailey. “This recommended budget took my breath away and I say that with all due respect, but I can’t operate on the budget that’s been offered.”
Other requests were as follows:
• An associate judge/juvenile master position for the Mental Health Court
• One full-time deputy fire Marshall for the Emergency Services Department
• One tax specialist for the Hays County Tax Assessor
• A justice clerk position for the Justice of the Peace Precinct 2 office
• One part-time shared juvenile diversion coordinator for the Justice of the Peace offices
• Two state-required shields for Constable Precinct 5 and a position regrade
Criminal District Attorney’s Office
• Raising the pretrial and trial budget from $1,000 to $3,000
• Raising the expert witness services budget from $1,500 to $5,000
• Raising the budget for continuing education from $38,000 to $50,000
• An attorney 3 position
• Regrade two members of the digital media evidence team
County Clerk’s Office
• New equipment to replace out of date or unusable technology
• Raising the budget for postage from $22,000 to $25,000
• One new position
• Five position regrades
• New software program
After hearing all of the presentations, the commissioners asked for documents outlining the financial costs to be brought back at a later meeting.
To listen to the full discussion, visit bit.ly/4covBX7.
