CAIRO — The Grady County Board of Commissioners has unanimously approved a measure that will provide a 3 percent pay increase to county hourly employees for the remainder of the fiscal year.

The raise also includes part-time employees and will go into effect for the pay period beginning June 19.

Discussion of any additional pay increases will be revisited next year when the budget is assembled.

Previously, the commissioners placed potential cost of living adjustments (COLA) on hold due to uncertainty as the initially-approved budget was revised, but County Administrator Buddy Johnson said the issue could be revisited later in the year.

“We’ve spent a good bit of time the last three months really watching this to see if it was something we could do,” Johnson said at Tuesday’s commission meeting.

An amended budget, which Johnson said is tight, was adopted in December. 

With the assistance of finance director Holly Murkerson, it was determined that the county had room to spare for the pay increases.

“Our employees have certainly pulled their weight and more and this is very deserving and overdo,” the county administrator said in a letter to the commissioners.

Johnson said that most salaried employees have been given raises in previous years while hourly employees were not.

While not discounting the value of salaried employees, the county administrator said this time the commissioners needed to take care of the workers who take care of them.

“It has always been my experience that the greatest asset to any organization is the line level workers, as they are the people that literally get the job done,” Johnson said.

A motion to approve the COLA was made by Commissioner Keith Moye and was seconded by Ray Prince. The commissioners then unanimously approved the measure.

Johnson is also proposing an increase of 2 to 2.5 percent to all employees except constitutional officers in fiscal year 2020.

The proposed increase will be based on the revenue availability, and the move comes as Johnson is requesting all county departments to trim 2 percent from their operating budgets.

Constitutional offices will receive mandated pay raises in 2020 and 2021.