Fair wages for Carbon County employees was a discussion the county commissioners and salary board had several times in 2023.

At the end of 2022, the board released a new wage scale based on findings of a salary study that looked at surrounding counties’ wages.

It all came to a head in January when salary board members squared off during the annual salary board meeting, which spanned two days after disagreements and extensive discussions took place.

In the end, court employees received no raises for the year, while several other departments additional raises above what was proposed were narrowly approved, only to be negated in February.

At the time, the salary board and commissioners split their thoughts on what the increases should actually be.

Commissioners’ Chairman Wayne Nothstein and Controller Mark Sverchek sided with row officers for higher increases, while Commissioners Chris Lukasevich and Rocky Ahner opted for staying within the budgeted amounts for the time being.

Ahner said that while he is for fair living wages, this new scale and the set salaries was only step one in the county’s plan for better wages.

Over the next few months, several employees left county service, some citing feeling unappreciated.

Several months later, the county opened up an appeals process for employees and managers who felt their raise was incorrect based on their workload.

Former employee Wendy Smelas also questioned the board regarding their actions.

During that meeting in June, Ahner all other departments except for the courts, which Smelas fell under, first accepted the proposed wage scale. The courts chose to make their own scale.

Because of this, those court positions stayed at the 2022 rates once the commissioners voted down funding the extra raises.

He said that the new wage scale is working now that it is in place because employees or department heads who feel that positions still need to be adjusted are appealing and updating job descriptions.

Ahner also cited several actions the salary board took over the last few weeks on positions that went through the appeals process. Some were determined to either a grade upgrade or step upgrade, giving that position a higher salary.

The discussion died down the second half of the year, but will again ramp up next Tuesday when the annual salary board is held. The board will include two new faces, Michael Sofranko and Kayla Herman.