At last week’s Madison County Commission meeting, area commissioners discussed potential raises for local elected officials.

The discussion began with item nine on the meeting agenda: “Resolution regarding Madison County Sheriff’s Compensation.” Madison County Attorney Jeff Rich described the resolution.

“This resolution is before you for consideration with regard to requesting the legislature to approve a raise in the compensation that would be due to the Madison County Sheriff,” Rich said.

Rich explained, “… historically legislative action has been required for raises to compensation for elected officials who are paid through the Madison County funds.”

Rich also said that the legislature typically does not want to proceed with those legislative acts without official approval from the commission.

Members of the commission also wanted to ensure that all local elected officials, not just the sheriff’s office, would be considered for a raise.

District Five Commissioner Phil Riddick was the first to voice his concerns with the resolution.

“Obviously, the pay needs to be bumped, but for me to be happy with this, I have to have a commitment that our next thing is going to be to look at salaries for the other elected officials,” Riddick said.

The resolution came on the heels of a recent pay study for the Madison County Sheriff’s Office that recommended an increase in the sheriff’s salary.

Madison County Sheriff Kevin Turner addressed the commission members’ concerns about the resolution and explained its origin.

“This came about with the case study done on our sheriff’s office and our sheriff’s department on the patrol side of the house, which y’all graciously passed that case study where you got the deputies where they want to be,” Turner said.

Turner continued, “In the meantime, they also were doing a case study on myself, which they did not at the time understand that they had to go through legislation to do so. They did the pay study on myself, then they started on the jail, which they’re doing at this time.”

Turner said the case study showed the sheriff’s office and jail are significantly underpaid compared to similar-sized counties in Alabama.

Turner clarified several times that he was not addressing the commission to encourage a raise for himself but for his team as a whole.

“I did not originate this pay raise, but let’s talk about it, and let’s talk about this is not anything that is a pay raise for Kevin Turner. This is a pay raise for the Office of Sheriff of Madison County,” Turner said.

Madison County Commission Chairman Mac McCutcheon thanked Turner for speaking at the meeting and answering questions about the resolution.

“We’re trying to wrap our arms around this because at the end of the day, any elected official that gets a pay raise, it’s a legislative process,” McCutcheon said.

McCutcheon continued, “This commission here is responsible for passing the budgets and making those expenditures. And for that reason, that’s why we’re concerned today, and that’s why we’re having this discussion that we’re going forward with.”

Turner also assured the commission that he is happy with his job.

“There is nothing that I love more than serving this county, this city, and the people that put me in office. And whether I get this, whether the office gets this, whatever the case, I’m going to be happy. I’m going to do my job accordingly. I just want to make that perfectly clear,” Turner said.

Madison County License Director Mark Craig also spoke at the meeting, sharing his concerns that a case study on his and other elected officials’ compensation was not done in conjunction with the study for the sheriff’s office.

He and other elected officials who discussed this issue wanted to emphasize that they are not attacking Turner and highly respect the good work he does for the sheriff’s department.

McCutcheon read a statement from Madison County Probate Judge Frank Barger, who also echoed a similar point of view on the matter. Judge Barger was unable to attend the meeting due to scheduling conflicts.

One of the questions in Barger’s statement was, “When will the same compensation study be completed and a salary increase proposal be made for all other countywide elected officials funded by the commission?”

After a lengthy discussion on the resolution, the commission voted to amend the original resolution for the sheriff’s compensation with the contingency that they would make an effort in good faith to evaluate and, where appropriate, amend the compensation for the other elected county officials during this legislative session.

They also defined the parameters for the current and future raises in the sheriff’s office.

Rich explained the amendment to the resolution by saying, “The county commission will make a good faith effort to evaluate the remaining elected officials paid through county commission funds in an effort to, where appropriate, amend compensation through the legislative process.”

Other matters discussed during the meeting included leadership vacancies at local institutions, such as the Madison County 310 Board, the Top of Alabama Regional Housing Authority, the Huntsville/Madison County Convention & Visitors Bureau, and WellStone.

The Madison County Commission meets every other Wednesday at 10:00 a.m. at the Madison County Courthouse in downtown Huntsville. The meetings are open to the public and can also be watched online either live or archived.