Town Agrees to Raises, Highway Workers to Pay More for Insurance

Town highway employees have negotiated a new contract with the town that gives them a general wage increase of 1.5-percent for the first year, 1.75-percent for the second and 1.9-percent for the third year, officials said.

In exchange, the town is switching their insurance plan to one that imposes a higher deductible on workers and reduces the cost to the town, officials said. Additionally, workers who before contributed a flat amount toward their health insurance plan – on average about 3-percent – will now contribute 6-percent the first year, 7-percent the second and 8-percent the third, officials said.

"It's a very reasonable contract," First Selectman Pat Llodra said, adding the town and employees worked out the deal without use of arbitration or outside agents. "(The contract) has some benefits for the workers and at the same time was affordable for the town."

The negotiated contract will cost the town a total of about $10,000 more this year for the approximately two dozen employees, Llodra said. Last year, the same workers received no wage increase, she said.

Llodra said that it is to the town's benefit to rein in the cost of health care, which has continued to increase every year. That is why the move from the most comprehensive health plan to one that requires more out-of-pocket expenses is a benefit to the town, Llodra said, adding that estimates place the savings at this point at about 4-percent.

Changing the cost-share formula to one that increases every year also is a benefit to the town, particularly in light of rising insurance costs, Llodra said.

"It'll never match the increase but it will help offset it," she said of the cost-share formula.

The Legislative Council approved the necessary budget transfers from contingency to payroll and other accounts on Oct. 20 to allow for the new contract. The vote was nine members in support and three against. None of the council members who voted to deny the request – Ben Spragg, Dan Amaral and Rich Woycik – said anything during the meeting to indicate their reasons.

Replying to a request for comment in an e-mail, Spragg said he had complained previously that he did not like being asked to approve year-end transfers on items where there was no choice but to approve. In this case, the town had already agreed to give the highway workers raises, and so the council was left with little choice, he said.

"I also voted no because I did not agree with taking the money from contingency," Spragg said in the e-mail. "I feel the money should come from the savings in health insurance costs. In my opinion, the health insurance fund will be in very good shape at the end of this fiscal year even if the health insurance savings were used to  fund the majority of this transfer."

Officials have said they want to make sure that health insurance is well-funded particularly now that the town has moved toward self-funding.