Faulkner County Reports

Accountability, Ethics, & Transparency in Government

Committees Ready to OK Almost $300,000 in Salary Hikes

Faulkner County’s Quorum Court Committees are kicking into gear for the 2024 budget cycle, with about $300,000 in proposed salary hikes on September agendas. There’s also a proposal for an election to allow the Pine Valley Volunteer Fire Department to collect operational dues.

Meanwhile, even though the County has several ongoing ARP-funded infrastructure projects, the Court’s Infrastructure & Roads Committee has yet to meet for oversight activities or new business this entire year.

Personnel Resolutions

Coming in as Personnel Resolutions with no sponsorship, five Resolutions propose around $50,000 in salary hikes, including:

Personnel Resolution 23-05 proposes about $174,000 in raises across the entire Sheriff’s Department, bringing the “new money” total for the County to $224,000.

Dedicated Funds Seem Unlimited

Personnel Resolution 23-01 for Library salaries is a different animal, as any “new money” for these increases comes from tax revenue strictly dedicated entirely for the Library’s use.

As long as expenditures remain below the total revenue, the Faulkner County Library continues to gain approval to raise salaries. It seems there’s plenty of tax dollars in the Library’s tax fund. (Ordinance 23-25 also moves $25,000 from the Library’s construction funds to pay for plumbing/electrical work plus another $25,000 transfer from the construction funds for part-time salaries.)

(Interesting to compare with other county libraries across Arkansas that are facing funding woes and greater oversight for pushing inappropriate sexual content to children, especially after last year’s issues on this front as the Court was dragged into a firestorm after five JPs voted against an unwelcome Library Board reappointment by County Judge Allen Dodson. The day after that Quorum Court meeting, the Library suddenly cancelled all public meeting room reservations, citing “confusion” and “pressure” by JPs after dueling gay/Christian story hours had been held in public rooms.)

In Personnel Resolution 23-01, proposed salary hikes range from 11% for Director John McGraw and 16% more for the Assistant Director to 28% for the Assistant Technical Processor and 22% for the Garden Programmer. Library assistants didn’t fare as well; those raises ranged from 10% to 12%. New raises for the County Library add up to $66,228.

In May, 2022 when the the Quorum Court approved some $225,000 in raises for County employees, JP Tyler Lachowsky (R, Dist. 6) had urged Library Director McGraw to bring another raise request “somewhere down the road … to get them up above the average if we need to.”

Other Committee Business

The Budget & Finance Committee takes another run at an Amended Ordinance 23-23 (appropriations from last month) as well as considering the current Ordinance 23-25 appropriations.

Personnel Chair JP Kris Kendrick (R, Dist. 9) sponsors Ordinance 23-26, which sets up the Sheriff’s Overdose Response Team being funded by a recently received grant from the Arkansas Opioid Recovery Partnership.

JP Sam Strain (R, Dist. 4) sponsors Resolution 23-07 and Ordinance 23-27 with an emergency clause that allow the Pine Village Volunteer Fire Department to hold an election in March, 2023 to levy fire department dues.

Specifics about the “animal shelter discussion” and “jail expansion discussion” were not released on the agenda for the Courts & Public Safety Committee.

Committee meetings begin at 6 pm on September 12 at the County Courthouse and livestreamed. The September Quorum Court meeting is moved to Thursday, September 21, due to conflict with the County Fair parade.