(Seguin) – For the first time in county history, a Guadalupe County Salary Grievance Committee was put into motion, taking what it thought was the right action regarding the request of three elected officials.
The nine-member committee met on Monday at the Guadalupe County Courthouse, with County Judge Kyle Kutscher presiding. The committee is made up of nine citizens selected from individuals who served on a grand jury during the previous year.
Justice of the Peace Precinct 3 Judge John Terry, County Clerk Teresa Kiel, and Precinct 1 Constable James Springer each brought grievances before the committee, but their requests and the reasons behind them were different.
The committee’s recommendations will now be forwarded to the Guadalupe County Commissioners Court, which is scheduled for Tuesday.
Setting the stage for the special meeting was Judge Kutscher who explained how the county is working to balance its Fiscal Year 2027 budget amid slowing revenue growth, declining taxable values, additional state-authorized exemptions and rising operating costs. He noted that the proposed property tax rate represents an increase of about 5.6 percent, which county officials have said is necessary just to generate approximately the same amount of revenue needed to operate last year’s budget.
Judge Terry was the first elected official to appear before the committee.
His grievance has centered on the county’s decision to provide a 3 percent cost-of-living adjustment to eligible county employees while excluding elected officials.
Terry told the committee he was not only pursuing the grievance simply to increase his own compensation. Instead, he said he wanted the county’s policies and the process used to exclude elected officials from the COLA to be examined.
“This is not for me to gain any extra money, hardly. I think it’s $102 a paycheck with a gross income. So, it’s not much. But my thing today is a grievance has never been filed and commissioners court can sometimes get a little out of control. And this is basically to hold commissioners court accountable,” said Terry.
Terry argued that the county’s personnel policy addresses across-the-board pay increases and COLAs and does not clearly exclude elected officials. He said that if elected officials were going to be excluded, he believed Commissioners Court should have provided a reason.
He also warned that failing to adjust elected officials’ salaries could create a larger compensation problem in the future.
The committee ultimately voted 6-2 to recommend a COLA increase for Terry, bringing his annual salary to $97,972.
Following Terry was Kiel.
Her grievance was based on the responsibilities of the County Clerk’s Office, including the statutory duties of the office and additional responsibilities she said have fallen on her, particularly in connection with elections.
Kiel’s current proposed base salary was $103,400. She initially requested an increase of $10,000, bringing her salary to $113,400, along with a $3,000 vehicle allowance.
The committee initially voted 4-4 on a motion to deny her request. After further consideration, members returned to the issue and approved a revised recommendation by a 7-1 vote.
The committee recommended a salary of $106,450, an increase of just under 3 percent.
During the hearing, Kiel pointed to the workload carried by her office and the additional demands she has taken on while continuing to fulfill her statutory responsibilities.
Springer was the third elected official to appear before the committee, but unlike Terry and Kiel, he was not asking the committee to increase his salary.
Springer told the committee he was comfortable foregoing the 3 percent COLA. His grievance was instead focused on how the county handled the decision and what he viewed as an inconsistent approach to compensation.
He questioned why some county employees earning more than $100,000 could receive the 3 percent increase while elected officials earning less were excluded.
“I’m okay with not receiving it. But I think it should have been handled differently. I think that if the county is in such dire straits financially, maybe they should have kept it. Maybe they should have said, all right, $60,000. Everybody making under $60,000 is going to get that 3 percent. Everybody who is above $60,000 — and I’m not saying $60,000 is the right number — but it should have been capped maybe,” said Springer.
Springer said he believed the county could have targeted the limited COLA dollars toward employees at the lower end of the pay scale while leaving higher-paid positions unchanged.
He also expressed concern about the long-term consequences of creating different compensation structures for county employees and elected officials.
“But keep in mind that if I do — if somebody who’s making $45,000, they really, I would imagine they really need that cost of living. But I make $88, and I’m not going to receive that. But then you have somebody with the county that’s making $120 a year, but they’re receiving it. That doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t know how that is a money-saving issue,” said Springer.
Maybe even more important was being able to publicly stress that he did not believe other elected officials during the budget process should speak on his behalf regarding whether he should receive a raise. This came into question when some other elected officials such as Guadalupe County Sheriff Joshua Ray, who he mentioned during the hearing, had reportedly said that they – elected officials – did not need the raise. This was all reportedly done when elected officials were trying to find additional ways to generate additional dollars to help cover their requests.
“I don’t have any problem with any other elected official coming up in here and speaking. They’re allowed to. Right? But I’m watching or it feels like commissioners court is making decisions based upon what he says. And that’s where I have a problem. So, he spoke, other people spoke, said no 3 percent. That’s what y’all did. And now I have my budget, and I had requested 2 new positions in there and somebody — the sheriff has interjected and now my budget is his recommendation. That’s not right,” said Springer.
In the end, the committee unanimously voted 8-0 to recommend keeping Springer’s salary at its current $92,855.
Meanwhile, only two people spoke during the public comment portion of Monday’s hearing.
The first was Guadalupe County Commissioner Pct. 1 Jaqueline Ott. Ott addressed the committee on the seriousness of the county’s current financial situation, noting that county employees and elected officials have taken on additional responsibilities over the years without necessarily receiving additional compensation.
Ott said she appreciated that Kiel had brought attention to the workload and responsibilities associated with her position, particularly as the county continues to face increasing demands.
Commissioner Pct. 4 Stephen Germann also addressed the committee, explaining the financial pressures facing the county and providing additional context for how the commissioners court arrived at its decision regarding the COLA.
The discussion underscored the difficult balance facing county officials: providing competitive compensation and recognizing increased workloads while keeping the county’s budget financially sustainable.
He also cautioned against assuming that salary comparisons with other counties automatically translate into having the same salary structure for Guadalupe County.
“There is a county in West Texas called Loving County, has less than a hundred people who live in it, got a tremendous amount of oil revenue. They have more money than they know what to do with. All of their elected officials make over $100,000 a year in a county that has less than 100 people. And we have 210,000 people in Guadalupe County. Harris County now that has six or seven million people in it just had a salary grievance committee hearing because only one elected official was not getting raised to $305,000. That’s the spectrum of county government and the decisions that are made because there’s different dynamics that go on and all these things,” said Kutscher.
Again, the Salary Grievance Committee’s recommendations are not the final salary decisions.
The recommendations will be handed to Commissioners Court Tuesday as the court continues consideration of the Fiscal Year 2027 budget.