It’s not healthy for the county to leave CMS hourly workers behind
The FY 2021 recommended county budget clearly reflects Mecklenburg County’s desire that education remain the No. 1 priority. It expands support services ahead of a school year when students’ social and emotional needs are likely to be critical, and it continues to make Pre-K available to more of our families.
However, pay for CMS’s hourly employees is a topic that deserves further discussion.
Hourly staff have always been the backbone of our school system. Each day Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools’ front office workers, cafeteria staff, bus drivers, teaching assistants and custodians perform essential duties that enable all of our operations to run smoothly. Their minimum wage is currently $13.22, and County Manager Dena Diorio is recommending against funding CMS’s request of $2.8 million to bring it to $14.11.
In 2018, North Carolina increased hourly pay for most state employees to $15/hr. That change did not apply to public school workers.
Mecklenburg County employees saw pay raised in February 2019 to $15/hr, which Diorio said at the time was necessary to “attract and retain the best employees.” That raise was followed by another 5.5% across the board raise in last year’s budget. This year Diorio wants to spend $9.2 million to give county workers yet another bump of 3%.County workers deserve that raise and more. But let’s look at one reason why we can’t afford to leave Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools’ hourly employees behind in this year’s budget.
In school year 2020-21, CMS will no doubt be following strict protocols for cleaning and disinfecting schools to reduce the spread of the COVID-19 virus. Recent CDC guidelines for reopening call for regular cleaning of surfaces and objects that are touched by multiple people. Every day when schools close, we’re going to need a full contingent of custodians to ensure that the learning environment is safe for our children when they come back the next day.
Currently we don’t have a full contingent. In fact, vacancies on CMS’s custodial staff stand just under 10%, leaving janitors responsible for cleaning about 39,000 square feet daily. Declining to raise hourly employee’s pay will make it very difficult to fill those crucial positions.
Chuck Brown is a CMS custodian who has worked for CMS for 15 years but still struggles to pay rent on an apartment that is too small for his family. He says it’s not uncommon for CMS hourly employees to pick up overtime or work additional jobs for a 70-80 hour work week just to make ends meet.Kenneth Pless, a CMS head custodian who spoke at Wednesday’s county budget hearing, says it’s time for the county to pay him and his colleagues a living wage. He noted the work CMS’s hourly employees do is “not just a job, it’s one of the most important working pieces in our system.”
Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools has about 3,100 employees earning less than $15/hr at the moment. Increasing their minimum wage to $15 and addressing compression would cost roughly $10 million. It’s an investment that was already overdue, and the pandemic has made this move even more urgent.
We are facing an economic crisis of unknown proportions, and we have to be cautious about how we spend. But we must keep the health and safety of Mecklenburg County residents at the forefront of our decision making as well as ensuring that the backbone of our school system is strong. Raising CMS hourly employees pay to $15/hr will help us to do both of those things.