Former county workers eligible

Roughly 150 Clark County workers will have a chance to receive pay raises from an employer for whom they no longer work.

County commissioners voted unanimously on Tuesday to give the former workers another chance to apply for pay raises they missed. Covering the back pay could cost the county an estimated $130,000.

"If they worked, they earned it," Commissioner Lawrence Weekly argued.

Labor negotiations between the county and public employees union were at an impasse for eight months after the contract expired in July 2006.

County workers who left their jobs during that eight-month period were eligible to receive money to cover the 3 percent raises they would have gotten had the labor contract been approved before the old one expired.

Former employees were given 30 days to apply for the retroactive raises.

Last month, several commissioners resisted awarding pay raises to people no longer employed with the county. But on Tuesday they all agreed that the former employees may not have been told about the money or the deadline.

Chester Haase, a retired airport employee who now lives in Arizona, said he waited a month to get the back pay. When he didn't receive it, he called the county and found out it was too late to apply.

"This plan was unrealistic and unfair," Haase wrote in a letter to the Review-Journal.

In a written recommendation last month, County Manager Virginia Valentine acknowledged that many former workers weren't told of the money due them.

However, the contract did not state that the county was responsible for notifying them, Valentine wrote. She noted the union drafted the terms for the back pay.

A union leader said that people who gave 20 or 30 years to county shouldn't suffer because of unclear guidelines.

"What happened was there wasn't fairness in this process," said Jane McAlevey, executive director of the Service Employees International Union Local 1107.

Commissioner Bruce Woodbury said he would support the back pay "out of a sense of fairness," but he added that he doesn't think former workers should qualify for these kinds of benefits.

Woodbury and other commissioners called for deleting the contract language that requires giving pay raises to workers who leave during labor talks.

"This is antiquated language," Commissioner Chris Giunchigliani said.