May 7, 2015

From: Public Safety

To: City Council
Subject: Pay Compression and Inversion
Dear City Council,
We the members of Public Safety, wish to raise attention to a situation in which our uniformed
members have been adversely impacted by pay compression and inversion; this impact will continue
until resolved. The members specifically impacted are those who have been promoted during their
tenure in their respective department.
The manner to which the pay decompression component of the new performance pay system
was applied ommitted some compressed personnel and even created significant compression and
inversion in others. Inversion occurs when an employee of equal or less rank and less tenure in the
department or position is compensated at a higher rate than an employee of higher rank and/or tenure.
We acknowledge inversion can occur in an extreme case such as tenure. For example a long tenured
member, who has moved into higher portions of their respective pay range, may be compensated more
than a newly promoted high ranking member with less tenure and is positioned in the lower portion of
their pay range. However, this is not the case with our argument.
When the recent decompression was applied, it did not take into account the years a promoted
employee may have worked without pay increases in their previous pay grade; it only applied to time
in-grade in their current pay grade. Many long tenured members, who had been promoted, were not
decompressed for the years worked without pay increases at previous ranks. To complicate this further,
newly promoted members were also not eligible for a merit raise or decompression, so the relative
increase of the promotion increase was diminished in comparison to members who received merit
raises. Subsequently members who were decompressed and recieved merit raises have since been
promoted. So, those negatively impacted by this situation, are being compensated significantly less
than members with less tenure and time in grade, and some with less rank.
The impacted members will never have the situation corrected through future pay increases;
their pay will lag behind. Sara Weller, Director of Human Resources, stated in the news article, Over
time, however, the new Fire Captain will move in front of the 20 year veteran. If merit increases are a
simple percentage of the employee's salary and not connected to their rank, then how can the new
Captain catch the 20 year veteran's pay, except the veteran stopping at top pay?
We respectfully disagree with the positions presented by the Human Resources Department that

the system will resolve compression and inversion over time, and that solving the problem will create
more and larger issues. We contend the issue can and should be corrected. Our members brought this to
the attention of Human Resources two years ago and have since put effort into avoiding this condition
only to see their concerns and evidence dismissed.
This situation is simply, but significantly, attached to the perception of how our members
perceive they are valued by their employer. They have pursued, through great effort, to better
themselves and the organization through the added responsibilities that come with promotion. This
pursuit should not diminish their advance in salary relative to their members. However, these promoted
members have been adversely impacted through the execution of the Decompression and Pay for
Performance Plan.
Our public servants are committed to providing the highest level of service. We request that all
our members be considered fairly and be fully recognized for performance and tenure. We humbly
petition for a transparent and collaborative opportunity, with all stakeholders represented, to resolve
this situation.

The following numbers represent actual employees and are meant to serve as a few
examples of an across-the-board problem for every employee who was promoted prior to July 1,
2014. We acknowledge that compression and inversion may be an issue for other city
departments; however the issue is most pronounced and recognizable in public safety due to the
para-military rank structure.

Officer
Cpl
Sgt

total
years
service
21
21
21

years in
current
grade
21
8
5

Salary
effective
7/1/14
$ 47,962.21
$ 45,459.81
$ 47,907.39

The three employees have been with DPD for the

identical amount of time. The Cpl. Should be 10%
more than Officer and Sgt. Should be 10% more than
Cpl.

Understand from the above example that the Sergeant held the rank of Corporal for five years
prior to being promoted to Sergeant. Imagine now if the Officer gets promoted and receives a
10% raise. They will be making over $52,000.00-substantially more than their peer/supervisor.

total years
service
Employee A
10
Employee B
9

Employee C
Captain
Lieutenant

total
years
service
24
24

years in
current
grade
6
0

Percentage
through current
pay grade
23%
29%

Percentage of
years in decompression
grade
received
4
6%
18
27%

Employee A and B are of equal rank. Employee B was

promoted after July 1, 2014. Employee B received full
10 years of decompression whereas Employee A only
received 6. Then Employee B was recently promoted

This example represents the same employee. The

employee was promoted to Captain, however had
they not been promoted, they would be making
$4,500.00 more annually than their current salary.
They would have made more by not being promoted.

This employee is making less than their subordinates who have 15 years in grade as a Lieutenant.
Even though, the Captain had more tenure and time in grade as Lieutenant prior to being
promoted.
It is mathematically impossible for any pay-for-performance raise to work out the
compression issues. The only way for pay-for-performance to work is for compression to be
addressed first in its totality. Higher performance raises will not fix the problem. Every
subsequent promotion will only make compression worse. These are three examples
representative of the disparity experienced by every individual who was promoted before July 1,
2014.