Council sends retention bonus resolution back to finance committee

LACONIA — City council is exploring options to provide city employees with a retention bonus in an effort to stem the flow of workers from Laconia to other towns in the Lakes Region and beyond. 

The description of a city resolution to provide a $2,500 retention incentive to all city employees noted a stark labor market has contributed to the city’s problem with staffing open positions and retaining quality employees. 

Following discussion, councilors chose to send the resolution back to the city’s finance committee for revision.

“The City of Laconia, not unlike many other public and private entities, finds themselves in a competitive labor market. Our city employees often find themselves with an opportunity to move on to other communities for increased salary and or benefits. The fiscal year budget addresses some of the salary and benefits adjustments needed to recruit and retain quality city employees,” the description read. “As part of the retention effort the City Manager has been asked to investigate the possibility of extending a $2,500 retention incentive to all city employees, payable within the FY 24 budget. The total impact of fulfilling this payment is $415,000 depending on the number of employees working at City Hall at the time of the payment.”

Councilor Robert Soucy (Ward 2) said he’s been looking at the issue of retention with City Manager Kirk Beattie and the finance committee.

“We’ve identified a number of different towns and cities within our local area, we’re losing people right off the street,” Soucy said. “As Councilor [Bruce] Cheney said earlier, we’re down nine in the police department. I know the public works department has got a serious issue all the time, so it’s just one more step along the whole package. We’re sending a message to employees.”

Beattie told Mayor Andrew Hosmer the city would be able to fund payment of a retention bonus through money usually spent in the winter, but saved this year because of better-than-usual weather.

“The two biggest pots of money would be in salary savings that we’ve seen because of being unable to fill these positions, which obviously we wouldn’t have if all of our positions were filled,” Beattie said. “And then, because of our mild winter that we’ve had, we do have some money left over in our winter maintenance account — generally we don’t have that money left over. What we do have leftover, we would put into the reserve. The reserve is healthy right now, so I’m not worried about needing to put more into that.”

Hosmer asked which city employees would receive the incentive.

“All the city departments. ... We can’t speak for the school department, but the city of Laconia employees. It includes all the departments here, it includes the water department. The water department has a separate budget, they have the funds within their budget to take care of that,” Soucy said.

“Employees of the Laconia Police Department, Laconia Fire Department, Department of Public Works, Water Department, City Hall — but it excludes the teachers?” Hosmer asked. 

“We can’t speak for that staff,” Soucy said. 

Hosmer asked if the incentive would include part-time and full-time employees.

“So I hadn’t really tiered it, broken it down, until today,” Beattie said. “My intent is, and again this is just suggesting, for our employees of 25 hours a week or more, which hit the majority of our employees — we have very few that are under that.”

Hosmer asked whether tenure would be required for employees to receive the incentive, and Beattie said that detail hadn’t been worked out yet.

“From my point of view, I would say that for part-time or less than 25 [hours], that we allow the city manager to prorate based upon the hours, if someone is really part-time in that sense,” Soucy said. “And as far as tenure, I’d have to wait for the city manager to make a recommendation, but I would think that we’d ask the person to be here, I don’t know, Jan. 1.”

Councilor Tony Felch (Ward 6) suggested there be an agreement between the city and employees who receive the incentive that an employee must stay with the city for a certain amount of time.

“If we give this $2,500, we expect to get another year out of you, or some number like that,” Councilor Bruce Cheney (Ward 1) said.

Beattie said such a stipulation would require contract negotiations with the employees' unions.

“I’m wondering if there’s another way to do this, to tier it to make it a little more equal and certainly make a significant statement of appreciation for our city employees, which I think is powerful,” Hosmer said. “One thing I’m struggling with a little bit, I’m actually struggling with it a lot, is how do we leave our employees of the SAU out of this? How do we leave our teachers, who have been frontline folks for some tough years starting in 2020, how do we leave them behind and not show our appreciation?”

Felch noted the school district operates on a separate budget from the city, as does the water department, and the water department was able to find the money in their budget for the incentive.

“You know, sometimes when I think of the City of Laconia, I think of us all being on the same team,” Hosmer said. “It’s SAU employees, it’s teachers, it’s firefighters, it’s the people in the City Hall, it’s our water folks, it’s our police department. I understand there’s some differences there, but I often think that they’re sort of the backbone of the city, in all departments.”

Councilors voted unanimously to table the issue and return it back to the finance committee for more analysis.

In other business, council:

• Heard from members of the Laconia Historical and Museum Society who brought historic items for council members to view

• Approved temporary traffic orders relative to Wake the Lake and Biketemberfest

• Approved a temporary traffic order for the History Happened Here Discovery Day event

• Approved a request for a building permit on a private road located at 119 Eastman Shore Road

• Approved Beattie to accept an easement from NHDOT needed to maintain Paugus Park Road

• Authorized Beattie or Hosmer to sign a grant agreement between the airport and NHDOT on behalf of the city

• Confirmed the city would not build sidewalks on Hillcrest Drive

• Passed an amendment to a zoning ordinance relative to unsafe structures

• Tabled a request to make a city-owned parcel on Lafayette Street conservation land until a study on the parcel could be disseminated