FARMINGTON – Franklin County commissioners agreed Tuesday to schedule a public hearing to settle a dispute over mileage payments for union employees.
They will propose that the hearing occur at 10 a.m. during or after their next scheduled meeting Aug. 17.
The dispute centers on mileage compensation as spelled out in the employees’ contract. Two dispatchers with the Sheriff’s Department filed a grievance stating that they should receive 37.5 cents per mile, the rate nonunion employees receive and the prevailing rate set by the federal government.
The dispute arises from two different references to mileage reimbursement in the contract. The contract specifically states that deputies will receive 27.5 cents per mile on one page, but a subsequent page says union employees will receive the “prevailing rate.”
Pike supported his employees’ interpretation of the contract but brought the matter to the commission because it affected the budget.
The commissioners, however, denied the request of the sheriff’s employees at their last meeting, saying that the contract language needed to be clarified in the next round of negotiations. They determined that “prevailing rate” in the contract referred to the rate given to deputies.
The two employees filing the grievance are not deputies, but are union employees bound by the same contract as deputies.
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