Personnel Board Chastises Selectmen for TM's Compensation Analysis Process
Groton Personnel Board members Bud Robertson, Mary Jennings and Dolores Alberghini presented the Board of Selectmen with their Annual Report containing a comprehensive list of their activities in serving on six Search Committees and a detailed list of policies and procedures which they helped write. These three Personnel Board members have more than 60 years collectively of Executive Level Human Resource experience, and serve as advisors to the Board of Selectmen.
Board Chairman Bud Robertson said as good as their work has been this past year, they were very disappointed that they were not called on by the Board of Selectmen to work with the Human Resources Manager on the Town Manager Compensation Analysis she was undertaking.
The town's Human Resource Manager, who reports to the Town Manager, was conducting the compensation data collection from various cities and towns in Mass.
Robertson said under the Dodd-Frank Law, compensation analysis needs to be done by an independent expert in order to avoid a Conflict of Interest. "This is required in private industry," he said, where many companies hire private consultants. The Dodd-Frank Law to which Robertson was referring is very specific in Section 952 on the independence of consultants or individuals performing the collection of data to be used for compensation analysis -to ensure that they are completely "free from any conflict of interest" and, if there is conflict of interest that it is identified, and that steps are being taken to rectify it.
Robertson chastised the Selectmen saying that the Personnel Board was "disappointed that the Board of Selectmen did not follow Best Business Practices. I am disappointed that we were pushed aside."
Selectman Josh Degen said he was not present at the BOS meeting where this was suggested by Chairman Jack Petropoulos and discussed by the Board. He said that he would definitely have supported Petropoulos' recommendation regarding the involvement of the Personnel Board in the Town Manager Compensation Analysis which, he stressed, would then "remove any bias." He noted that Human Resources could start the effort, but that the data should be well vetted before it gets to the Board of Selectmen.
Selectman Stuart Schulman said he thought that the Personnel Board was working on this, but Robertson replied, "We were told not to."
This was apparently as a result of what some Selectmen felt they had voted at a previous meeting, to explicitly not include the Personnel Board in this effort.
Selectman Degen made a motion and the majority of the Board of Selectmen voted that the work done by Human Resources would be "reviewed and the data codified on the Town Manager's salary" before it is presented to the Board of Selectmen. The vote was three to approve, (Selectmen Degen and Schulman, and Chairman Jack Petropoulos) and one abstention - Selectman Anna Eliot.
