Raises fuel debate on Kane County employee salaries

The issue of what is a fair wage when it comes to taxpayer-funded government employees’ salaries in Kane County gained new ground for debate Tuesday with proposed raises for two of the highest paid county workers.

The raises are part of a plan to reorganize the county’s Development Department unveiled by Kane County Board Chairman Karen McConnaughay.

One element of the plan involves shifting administration of the Mill Creek Special Service Area out of the department. The special service area is a tax on the roughly 5,000 residents of the Geneva-area subdivision that pays for the county to operate as the community’s public works department.

McConnaughay’s plan shifts those duties out of the Development Department, which is run by Mark VanKerkhoff. He earns a salary of about $107,000. The special service tax partially funds that salary and that of any other employees in the department who oversee Mill Creek.

McConnaughay’s plan gives control of Mill Creek to Tim Harbaugh, director of the county’s Facilities, Subdivision and Environmental Resources Department, and subdivision Project Manager Ken Anderson. As a result, the special services area money would instead fund part of Harbaugh and Anderson’s salaries. Harbaugh currently earns about $106,000. Anderson earns about $78,000.

Those salaries would increase under McConnaughay’s plan to reflect the additional duties. The size of those raises has not been discussed in public, but McConnaughay, in an interview, denied any talk that they could be as large as 20 percent. However, she does believe Harbaugh is worthy of a raise given a workload that’s increased following the retirement of former Development Director Phil Bus, who was not replaced.

“Tim’s job description has continued to change over the last two years, and there had been no recognition of that in the way he is paid,” McConnaughay said. “If somebody’s job changes should their salary remain the same regardless? Maybe so. The board has said it wants to be more involved in these salary issues. So now I’ve put the challenge in front of them.”

As the plan is currently structured, county taxpayers end up stuck with a higher burden on the back end.

The raises for Harbaugh and Anderson would be born by the residents of Mill Creek. However, there is no proposed decrease in salary for VanKerkhoff and members of the development department who lose the burden of the Mill Creek administrative duties. With the special service area funds leaving VanKerkhoff’s department, the burden for maintaining Development Department salaries at their current levels would shift to the general fund. The general fund is the county’s largest taxpayer-supported account.

McConnaughay said that’s a wrinkle she’ll leave to county board members to sort out. The board is also currently immersed in determining a fair wage for the yet-to-be-hired new animal control director.

Both debates set the stage for a report McConnaughay said she’s authoring on the county’s management structure and how it’s changed since 2004. That’s when McConnaughay became chairman. The report is partially a response to a lawsuit filed by Jim MacRunnels, a former challenger to McConnaughay’s chairman seat. MacRunnels believes McConnaughay gave employees raises without the full knowledge and support of the county board members. MacRunnels lost that lawsuit.

“Part of the case that I will make is this is a pretty effectively run county,” McConnaughay said of the forthcoming report. “This never was about Karen McConnaughay running around, giving her pet employees big raises.”