DISCUSSION
As a result of the equity study, specific classifications recommended to receive an adjustment to the salary range are as follows: Administrative Analyst, Benefits Supervisor, City Clerk, Deputy Director, Human Resources Manager, Parking Control Specialist, Human Resources Analyst, Police Communications Manager, Police Records Manager, Principal Administrative Analyst, Principal Human Resources Analyst, Program Specialist, Public Safety Fiscal Analyst, Public Works Trainee, Senior Administrative Analyst, Senior Human Resources Analyst, Senior Program Specialist, and Traffic Signal Electrician.
Attached is the summary of the 2023 Comprehensive Equity Study (Attachment I), which lists all full-time City classifications and reasons for any recommended change in salary range allocation. Part-time classifications were also studied and the City will bring forth recommendations for those classifications at a later date.
Salary range adjustments are recommended for various reasons and fall into several categories.
Legal Mandate: Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, overtime exempt positions are required to be paid at least a minimum salary amount, which is based upon the State’s current minimum wage or California Consumer Price Index. Some classifications require an adjustment to be in compliance with FLSA salary requirements.
External Equity: Based upon a survey of comparable classifications with the City’s comparator cities, a change in salary allocation is recommended to bring Garden Grove’s salary closer to the market median. Salary ranges 10% (or more) below the median are considered to be falling below market. A recommendation to change the salary range would bring the classification closer to the median salary.
Internal Alignment within a Job Series: Classifications are part of a job series and need to maintain appropriate internal alignment, or distance between each classification. In cases of when a benchmark classification was adjusted due to external equity, the whole job series was also studied to maintain salary structure and address compaction issues.
Internal Alignment across Job Series/Departments: Classifications at a similar level of complexity, responsibility, and supervisory controls, such as senior-level, supervisor, or manager classifications are analyzed to maintain equity between classifications for an agency as a whole. The classification system compares all classifications within a City to maintain organizational balance and equity.
Industry Standard: It is industry best practice to maintain a certain structure within each job series. There should be a specific range difference between entry, journey, advanced journey, supervisor, manager, and director classifications. Best practice maintains 10% between entry, journey, and advanced-journey level classes; 15% between supervisor and highest-level position supervised; 15%-20% between manager and highest-level position supervised; and 20%-25% between director and highest-level position supervised. Classifications were reviewed using these industry guidelines to correct compaction issues within a job series.
Recruitment and Retention: It is important to consider the salary of a classification relative to the difficulty of recruitment and retention. Obviously, salaries significantly lower than the market create serious challenges for recruiting. Some classifications need to be equitable with the private sector, beyond a comparison with the public sector. This is particularly true for full-time classifications that are filled on a part-time basis. Classifications were reviewed in light of the difficulty in recruiting, and what may be necessary to attract candidates and distinguish the City from competitors for entry-level positions.
Summary of Analysis
Primarily, recommendations for changes to the salary allocation were made to comply with overtime exemption requirements. The benchmark classifications of Administrative Analyst and Human Resources Analyst were determined to be exempt from overtime based upon the criteria established by the State. Although the duties and responsibilities meet the definition to be exempt, the current starting salary for these classifications no longer meets the salary requirements in order to be exempt from overtime. Under State law, employees covered under the Administrative Overtime Exemption “must earn a monthly salary equivalent to no less than two times the state minimum wage.” When the California minimum wage increased to $15.50 on January 1, 2023, the minimum salary requirement for the administrative overtime exemption increased to $31.00 per hour. Additionally, the salaries for these entry-level analyst classifications were below market for comparable classifications at other cities.
As a result of changes to the salary allocation for these benchmark classifications, staff also adjusted the salary allocation of other classifications listed in Attachment II using industry standard guidelines to maintain the salary structure between classifications within the job series and address compaction issues. Additionally, these changes are needed in order to attract and retain employees and will provide promotional and developmental opportunities to retain top talent for succession planning into supervisory and upper management positions.
Due to internal alignment across job series, it is recommended that the salary allocation for the Police Communications Manager and Police Records Manager also be adjusted. These classifications are similar in level of responsibility, complexity, and salary with the Principal Administrative Analyst. In order to maintain that equity across these three classifications, it is recommended that the salary allocation for both classifications of Police Communications Manager and Police Records Manager to be adjusted so they are on par with the Principal Administrative Analyst classification.
The equity study also revealed that the Traffic Signal Electrician and City Clerk classifications are below the median for comparable classifications at comparator cities. It should be noted that the minimum qualifications for City Clerk is lower than the comparator cities, which accounts for the lower salary allocation relative to other cities. However, in order to be aligned with other managerial classifications of similar responsibility and complexity, it is recommended to change the salary allocation as listed in Attachment II to bring it closer to market rates.
Aligned with Council’s direction to attract and retain employees, it is recommended to change the salary allocation for Public Works Trainee from U089 to U106 which provides for a 34% increase at the top step. As minimum wage has increased over the years, the City has encountered increasing difficulty in filling Public Works Trainee positions due to the nature of the position, the part-time work hours, and higher wages offered by competing employers. This has impacted the City’s ability to maintain service levels in the Public Works Department as they have been understaffed.
Additionally, it is recommended that the Parking Control Specialist classification be adjusted. Currently, Parking Control Specialist is at salary range U111.8, which is a nine (9) step salary range with three (3) steps at the exact same rate of pay. This is inconsistent with current full-time salary range practices, which is nine (9) steps with a difference of approximately 5% between each step. Therefore, it is recommended to change the salary range for Parking Control Specialist from U111.8 to U103 to correct the inconsistency in the salary rates.