Deputies, Sheriff’s employees get 2% raises

Workers will pay higher deductibles, reducing county’s health insurance costs

ALBION – About 70 Orleans County employees in the Sheriff’s Department will receive 2 percent pay hikes annually over three years.

The workers will pay higher deductibles to their health insurance, which will reduce county health premium expenses, Chuck Nesbitt, the county chief administrative officer, said today.

The savings in health insurance, about $4,000 less for a family premium, will make the contract “cost neutral” for the county when the raises are factored in, Nesbitt said.

The contract runs from Jan. 1, 2013 to Dec. 31, 2015. The health insurance savings are expected to offset the raises in 2014 and likely in 2015, Nesbitt said today after the County Legislature approved two contracts.

One agreement includes 24 deputies while the other covers 47 workers – dispatchers, corrections officers and civilian clerks. Past county employee contracts generally only included recent or new hires with higher deductible plans. Now all employees, regardless of seniority, are in the higher-deductible plans, which is helping the county offset some of the rising health insurance premiums, Nesbitt said.

With the two agreements approved today, all county employees are now under contract until at least the end of 2014.