Sherriff Lee Armijo declared the shortage and loss of deputies to other employers an emergency at the Socorro County meeting last week.
“To me it’s an emergency, I see it as an emergency because the safety of our community is our priority,” Armijo said “If we lose some of our key people, all of the progress over the last 8 or 9 years is just going to go through the floor…It’s something that has been keeping me up at night, I have some people I cannot lose.”
He said one of his best deputies left for another job after Armijo wasn’t able to offer him a raise, “I can’t blame him for that,”
He said in Bernalillo County deputies are starting at $83,000 a year and in Valencia County they start at $30 an hour plus retention bonuses; his current staff is taking notice. In Socorro County the deputy pay range is $19.50 to $24. 65. He said his dream is to get his staff at $27 an hour.
“We are having a hard time pulling in good applicants and when we do they want $30 and hour because that’s a pretty common pay rate around the state for law enforcement,” Armijo said “ If we could offer a competitive wage at least, it doesn’t have to be $30 an hour but something where they can say ‘we are pretty close’”
Deputy Manager
Sammie Vega Finch, interim county manager, gave a slide show presentation about her proposal to hire a deputy manager to help reduce the stress on administration and the high turnover rate.
“Our budget almost doubled what it was six years ago with the same staff,” Vega Finch said. “I strongly believe that Socorro County is in great need of a deputy county manager to support our department heads, relieve current administrative staff, implement systems to ease the burden of the operations and increase the overall effectiveness of our county.”
She said the pay range salary for the position would be from $90,950 a year to $107,000.
Ray Martinez, commissioner said he recognized the county manger job to be very stressful but wanted to know if it was something the county could afford.
Betty Saavedra, county clerk, asked if creating the new position would have an impact on raises for the future planned and requested raises for other departments such as the sheriff’s office, elected officials and the living wage.
Vega Finch said the budget has been growing and there is an opportunity to review the sheriff’s request and have the new position, she said she couldn’t speak specifically to the elected officials at that moment. She said she planned to have budgets ready for the next meeting.
“We have serval opportunities with the revenues we are bringing in and with our general fund GRT increasing and with our economy at present, I don’t see a problem,” Vega Finch said.
John Aguilar, commissioner, said he recognized the need for raises for everyone and the need for a deputy manager.
“I know it’s not about making everyone happy but I would like to try and want as many people happy…. I’d like to try and make this work for everyone,” Aguilar said.
Craig Sacatero said the he believed that hiring a deputy manager would help generate more money for the county.
“We’ve gone round and round the past couple of meetings,… I think in maybe a year or two years we will make that money back in regards hiring the deputy because I think two individuals will have stronger forefront going after grants,” Sacatero said.
Duggins, Gonzales absent
Ultimately commissioners voted to table the proposal for the third time, due to the absence of two commissioners, Glenn Duggins and Joe Gonzales.
“This is an important decision that will be in effect from now on, I would like to see the other two commissioners here. We are a commission this should be voted by the five commissioners. I would like to table it until the next meeting when we can see the upcoming budgets for all the departments and how we are going to fund that to include if we hire a deputy manager,” Martinez said.
The meeting ended with an executive session to discuss county manager applications.
