The Sunflower County sheriff's deputies are about to experience a positive modification in their earnings and work schedule.
On Monday, Sheriff James Haywood spent nearly 45 minutes making his appeal before the Sunflower County Board of Supervisors.
“Every time they go out it's hazardous,” Haywood said, “What I'm trying to do is increase their pay to a decent wage.”
In addition to a higher wage, Haywood said his other objective is to cut down on the amount of time that the deputies work in a day in order to cut down on fatigue. "Our people are working hard, long hours; the average deputy works 12 hours in a day," said Haywood. He also mentioned the possibility of giving the deputies comptime if they happen to work over 50 hours of overtime.
He added that in some cases his deputies have worked as much as 16 hours in a 24-hour period to make sure the county is properly covered.
They discussed several different scenarios regarding how to implement the change and in the end the members decided to allow Haywood to work out his own plan using his own discretion and then do a budget amendment to move money around. President Riley Rice said, "We have made the motion that we raise your deputies and we're letting you decide on your budget."
Jail Administrator Eddie Bounds is also seeking to make some adjustments with his employees. At a previous meeting, he presented a pay scale proposal and since that session he has reportedly met with the county administrator and the chancery clerk and arrived at a cost for his concept.
However, in an attempt to ward off another lengthy discussion regarding pay increases, District 1 Supervisor Glenn Donald proposed that Bounds' request be approved dependent upon his ability to execute a budget amendment to make it work.
"My motion is that I make the motion contingent that it fits his budget and that he does an amendment to fix his budget,” Donald said.
He explained that to be his motion as long as Bounds and Haywood can work out the budget agreement. “The sheriff is over the jail and the sheriff's department; he can move money from one to the other that's my motion," Donald said.
County Administrator Fred Washington suggested holding a more in-depth discussion before taking a vote on Donald's motion because the pay scale suggestion that Bounds was proposing would involve a $171,000 increase in the budget.
Undaunted by Washington's idea, Donald stated, “And if it can't be done they have to bring it back do a work session with you (the) County Administrator and you bring it back to us. Now, if y'all want to discuss it for 30 minutes let me know, I'll go out to the truck."
Washington reiterated that he had already discussed the matter with Bounds, Chancery Clerk Gloria McIntosh and other jail personnel.
"We already went through that one, so something drastically has to change. It’s $171,000, a $14,000 per month increase," Washington said.
In other business,
The bid opening for construction at the Parmida LED Technologies building has been postponed for another week due to minor adjustments made by the architect that affects the bid pricing.
Attorney Johnny McWilliams explained that the Supervisors could not accept the bids anyway, but would have to take them under advisement because based on their contract with Parmida, the company has the last say on the bids because they are the ones paying for the construction through their monthly rental payments.
It was voted on and approved that County Engineer Ron Cassada and Washington should open the bids, present them to Parmida for approval and then to the board.
Cassada updated the county lawmakers on several ongoing projects including the College Avenue bridge.
“Hopefully we'll get that bridge open within the next week or two,” Cassada said. According to him the paving was to start on Monday and after that all that's left is the sidewalks.
On Washington’s recommendation, the county lawmakers received and approved the contract for Three Rivers Planning and Development District and discussed the contract for the Levee Board building.
They also received an update on the new accounting staff annex.
Washington had originally stated that the space on Main Street would be ready for occupancy by this week, but has now adjusted his timetable to be by October 31.
