A change in Kentucky legislation at the end of spring’s General Assembly has caused Henderson County Attorney Steve Gold to request a bump in pay for his top assistant.
At Fiscal Court’s Tuesday morning meeting, Gold explained that the General Assembly decided to assign pay grades to the job levels of attorneys within county attorney’s offices across the state. He said the Prosecutor’s Advisory Council devised the appropriate job levels, based on years of service and job title, several years ago.
When the General Assembly decided at the end of the session to assign pay grades to those different levels many in Gold’s office got increases.
But Gold’s top assistant, Kyle Evans, the first assistant county attorney, did not.
That’s because Evans was originally hired in the county attorney’s office 12 years ago for work that would be paid for by county money. Gold said Evans’ work revolves around delinquent taxes, revising ordinances and resolutions for Fiscal Court, handling numerous bank accounts and dealings with the county government budget, among other tasks.
Evans can’t move over and handle any courtroom prosecuting because that work is paid for with state funds, Gold said.
When the new state pay levels were applied to attorneys in Gold’s office, some ended up at a higher salary than Evans, some of whom he oversees.
Gold sought to remedy that situation Tuesday. Because many of the attorneys’ salary had been replaced with state money, some of the county money used to pay them in the past was returned to the county attorney’s office.
He asked that $18,530 from that $82,000-plus paid back to the county attorney’s office be reallotted to Evans’ salary, bringing his pay in-line with the prescribed $112,200 pay for a first assistant county attorney with more than 10 years’ experience. About $14,500 of Evans’ bump will be in salary and about $4,000 more will go to FICA and retirement costs, Gold said. The court approved his request.
In other news, the Fiscal Court:
- Approved the preparation of a resolution that would allocate $203,000 to the Henderson County Water District. Judge-Executive Brad Schneider said the money can come from American Recovery Plan Act funds because water projects are a top guideline for use of ARPA funds.
“We have enough ARPA funds to do it,” Schneider said.
Pipes in the county are leaking water causing the district to lose money, Schneider said.
- County Engineer Nick Stallings asked the Fiscal Court permission to seek bids on base or asphalt work on nine roads in the county. The court approved his request. Stallings said work will occur from early September to mid-October. Gravel roads that will get asphalt include Dick Smith Road, Mill Cates Road and J Gibson Road. Additionally, the remaining gravel section of the road that cuts through Sandy Watkins Park will be asphalted, making the entire road throughout the park asphalt. Other roads that will have work completed are Alves Ferry, Mason Landing, Eblen Hancock, Collier Road and Zion Larue Road, Stallings said.
