Some City of Platteville employees will be receiving pay raises as part of a job classification and compensation plan the Common Council is expected to consider in May.

The Common Council got its first look at the plan during a work session last week. The plan, which as proposed includes a merit pay component, will take several years to implement, although some employees could see pay increases as soon as July.

The proposed plan creates a system for managing job salaries in the municipal work world after the state Legislature in 2011 passed Act 10, which essentially eliminated collective bargaining for public employees. That in turn resulted in numerous municipal employee unions decertifying across the state.

Since then, according to city documents, new employees have been hired at lower salaries with “no means for advancement,” there is different pay for similar positions, and city administrators cannot “communicate with new or future employees what to expect with respect to salaries.”

The plan includes “market-competitive positioning to the extent possible” for city positions based on a job analysis, evaluation by the employee’s supervisor, and rating of city positions by Carlson Dettmann Consulting of Madison based on job responsibilities.

The city is expected to spend $20,000 to raise the salaries of some employees to reach the pay range as determined by market conditions for that position. The CDC study reported that eight employees’ salaries were below the proposed salary range, four were above the salary range, and 52 were within the salary range.