KMPH Fox 26 Central San Joaquin Valley News Source in Fresno, California Entertainment, News, Sports and Weather | Tulare County Supervisors Get Pay Raise As Layoffs Continue

Tulare County Supervisors Get Pay Raise As Layoffs Continue

By Ariana Duarte and Winston Whitehurst

In January, Tulare County Supervisors voted to lay off more than 200 employees as part of its plan to cope with a nearly $2.5- million budget deficit, and County Supervisor, Allen Ishida says more cuts may be on their way.

"We also see coming up in the near future, further personnel reductions because of the state budget crisis," said Ishida.

But county employee and S.E.I.U. member Diane Evans says she doesn't understand why, in the midst of massive layoffs and a growing budget gap, Tulare County supervisors would give themselves a 4.5% pay raise.

"We were all going, what? They cut 255 jobs and they're giving themselves a raise," said Evans.

Evans said she learned of the pay raise Thursday, when the Visalia Times Delta reported supervisors approved the pay hike back in September 2008 as an item on the consent calendar.

Since then, the board has been accused of burying the item and using unclear wording, to avoid drawing attention to the boost in pay.

But supervisors deny any wrongdoing and say concerned community members should have asked the board to pull the item for discussion.

Now, county workers like Evans are calling on supervisors to retract last year's decision and put the money toward saving jobs and programs that remain on the line.

"There's other people in higher offices and other locations that have done the same thing," said Evans.

Meanwhile, County Supervisor Ishida announced Friday he's proposing a similar strategy for cutting back, which would include reversing pay hikes for everyone.

"Stop all pay raises that happened after January 30th, 2008," said Ishida.

Ishida says he has requested that his proposal be put on a future agenda.

If implemented the across the board raise retraction would also affect other county employees who recently received a 2.75% pay increase.