Job seekers may want to put \u201cScottsdale\u201d in their search engines.<\/p>\n
As the private sector job market tightens in Maricopa County, where the unemployment rate has nearly doubled since April 2024\u2019s 2.5%, the City of Scottsdale is looking to fill scores of openings.<\/p>\n
At its Oct. 21 meeting, City Council was asked to address an ongoing condition: \u201cchronic vacancies in police communications, water operations and water maintenance positions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Part of the solution, City Manager Greg Caton pitched, is allowing him to pay more.<\/p>\n
He asked \u2013 and received, by unanimous vote \u2013 \u201ccompensation adjustments\u201d for dispatchers, supervisors, treatment plant operators, electricians and technicians.<\/p>\n
Those people who answer when you call 911? Big shortage around here, according to Caton\u2019s presentation.<\/p>\n
\u201cCurrently there are 15 vacancies out of 40 full-time positions in the Police Communications Dispatch role,\u201d he outlined.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile all communication centers across the country have similar vacancy rates, there is proven remedy for this problem and (the) Gilbert Police Department has led the way.\u201d<\/p>\n
The winning formula: boost and raid.<\/p>\n
Caton said Gilbert had 16 vacant dispatcher positions in fiscal year three years ago \u2013 but, after bumping up their pay, \u201cthey filled all 16 of their vacancies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s how he knows:\u00a0 \u201cFive dispatchers joined them from the ranks of the Scottsdale Police Department who left for a significantly higher salary \u2026The first two dispatchers that left Scottsdale for Gilbert reported that they received a $10,000 to $12,000 raise \u2013 which promptly made three others leave for Gilbert.\u201d<\/p>\n
According to Caton\u2019s presentation, Scottsdale has 15 police dispatch openings and 32 water positions.<\/p>\n
In a retention move, Council also unanimously approved a new \u201cPublic Safety Compensation Philosophy,\u201d which requires the city to keep police officer and firefighter pay within the top three of benchmark cities in the local market.<\/p>\n
Scottsdale Police Chief Joe LeDuc thanked the leaders \u201cfor their continued support of our officers and their recognition that the foundation of any vibrant and healthy city is public safety.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis commitment to keeping Scottsdale\u2019s police officers \u00a0in a leading market position ensures we can retain and hire the very best.\u201d<\/p>\n
Scottsdale Fire Chief Tom Shannon added his team is \u201cgrateful for the mayor and city council\u2019s steadfast support of our firefighters.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis latest action affirms our shared commitment to excellence and ensures we can continue to attract and retain the best firefighters to serve our community.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Hot topic<\/strong><\/p>\n City job vacancies were also a topic of discussion at the Oct. 1 Budget Review Committee meeting.<\/p>\n City Manager Greg Caton gave a presentation, with a bullet-point list of \u201cInitiatives and Changes Made.\u201d<\/p>\n One of the bullet points: \u201cUnfilled positions ongoing review.\u201d<\/p>\n Mark Stephens, a committee member, made it a point to say there was “a misstatement” in a recent newspaper story that \u201cdisappointed\u201d him.<\/p>\n He later told the Progress he was alluding to an Aug. 31 Progress story on city vacancies.<\/p>\n Stephens said he feels the article \u201cinfers the budget is padded. My point is that the budget factors in expected unfilled positions as a negative expense (effectively a reversal of budgeted payroll of $11 million) thereby eliminating padding other cities use unfilled positions for.<\/p>\n \u201cI am still learning myself,\u201d Stephens allowed.<\/p>\n Yet, he insisted the article \u201comitted a key expense reversal element. To me it seemed unfair since it ignores the expense reversal.\u201d<\/p>\n Compared to David Smith, the former councilman and city treasurer who chaired the BRC before resigning last month, Stephens clearly has a different position on this topic.<\/p>\n Smith said he stands by his position on unfilled positions in the budget.<\/p>\n \u201cAssuming that every position will be filled and paid for the entire year develops a payroll estimate that is an absolute maximum,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen revenues are reserved for this conservative number, it means other community needs must be postponed or foregone altogether.”<\/p>\n At the BRC meeting, Caton followed Stephens\u2019 comments by saying, \u201cThere\u2019s a little misinformation out there\u2026 a couple years ago we had a high-water mark of a little over 300 (vacant) positions \u2026 it was probably a little excessive.\u201d<\/p>\n He then pondered the \u201cmagic number\u201d of city vacancies, musing \u201cmaybe somewhere between 75 and 125.\u201d<\/p>\n Caton said that, since he took over as city manager, he has been \u201creviewing every single job that becomes vacant \u2026 every single vacancy comes by my desk for approval.\u201d<\/p>\n Caton then repeated some figures on unfilled positions:<\/p>\n \u201cWe went from a high-water mark a couple years ago of a little over 300 to April of this year at approximately 188.\u201d<\/p>\n However, a presentation from City Treasurer Sonia Andrews stated the city has 301 vacant positions as of Aug. 1.<\/p>\n Responding to Progress questions about his presentation, Caton said, \u201cThe term \u2018misinformation\u2019 was not intended to convey any sort of malice \u2013 \u2018lack of clarity\u2019 may be a better way to say it.\u201d<\/p>\n He attached \u201ca snapshot look at vacancy numbers,\u201d showing 198 open jobs June 6, as compared to 191 the previous June and 183 on June 9, 2023.<\/p>\n \u201cAt the beginning of a fiscal year,\u201d Caton added, regarding the budget vacancy number, \u201cit’s almost always going to be at its highest \u2013 because that’s when new positions are on the books that we have not yet had a chance to fill.\u201d<\/p>\n Indeed, this year\u2019s budget added nearly 100 jobs \u2013 most in public safety.<\/p>\n \u201cYou’ll consistently see that by the end of the fiscal year,\u201d Caton said, \u201cthe numbers are substantially lower.\u201d<\/p>\n He noted that August numbers near the start of a fiscal year show around 10% vacancy over the past three years, \u201cversus June numbers at the end of a fiscal year which show less than 8%.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cGiven the tight labor market that is very competitive, this is a fair number for an organization our size.\u201d<\/p>\n And, Caton stressed, \u201cIt’s important to reiterate that we don\u2019t move labor funding to cover non-labor expenditures \u2013 labor savings created by vacant positions is built into the budget.\u201d<\/p>\n Underscoring Stephens\u2019s position, Caton said, in the current budget \u201cwe have planned for $11 million in vacancy savings over the course of the fiscal year.<\/p>\n \u201cSaid another way, we are required to have vacancy savings within this fiscal year that totals $11 million, or we will not meet this budgeted amount.\u201d<\/p>\n Acknowledging his “high-water mark of a little over 300 vacancies” statement, Caton said: \u201cYes, it was mentioned, but now we are calculating vacancies in greater detail and have more accurate numbers.\u201d<\/p>\n Of 98 new positions approved in the budget that began July 1, Caton said, \u201c39 have already been filled.\u201d<\/p>\n According to the city manager, as of Oct. 10, the city had 272 vacancies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Job seekers may want to put \u201cScottsdale\u201d in their search engines. As the private sector job market tightens…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":335592,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5131],"tags":[5229,5643,1587,1589,7600,166125,166126,89130,24646,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-335591","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-arizona","10":"tag-az","11":"tag-phoenix","12":"tag-scottsdale","13":"tag-scottsdale-city-coucil","14":"tag-scottsdale-city-manager","15":"tag-scottsdale-fire-department","16":"tag-scottsdale-police","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-united-states-of-america","19":"tag-unitedstates","20":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","21":"tag-us","22":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115445076197962988","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=335591"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/335591\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/335592"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=335591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=335591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=335591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}