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May 17, 2013
The Dispatch/Maryland Coast Dispatch
Page 27
. . Purnell: ‘You Showed Me Today What You Think Of Us Bus Drivers’
FROM PAGE 26 and insurance increases, that same employee spent about $647 more in fiscal year 2013, representing a loss of $47 despite the raise. Commissioner Judy Boggs said despite the savings realized by dropping from 2.5 percent to 2 percent, the requested salary increase should be fully funded. “We’re saving almost $400,000 by reducing the increase to 2 percent,” she said. “I think we should keep it at 2.5 percent. If we can do it, then we should.” However, Commissioner Jimmy Bunting said the only likely way to fund the entire 2.5-percent increase was to make up the difference from the county’s budget stabilization fund created to offset unexpected shortfalls. “We’re going to have to rob and steal from that budget stabilization fund in order to do this,” he said. “We can’t spend money we don’t have.” After a motion to set the salary hike at the requested 2.5 percent failed by a 4-3 vote, a second motion was made to set the increase at 2 percent. That motion passed by a vote of 4-3 with Church, Boggs and Commissioners Virgil
Shockley and Jim Purnell in favor. However, the commissioners still had the issue of salary increases for school bus drivers to consider and that debate touched off some fireworks. Shockley and Purnell recused themselves because they are school bus contractors, leaving only five commissioners to debate the bus driver salary increase. A first motion to set the school bus salary increase at 1 percent passed by a 3-2 vote, but the measure failed because a majority vote of four was needed for it to pass. A second attempt at a 2-percent increase for bus drivers met the same fate when the vote was 3-2 but four votes were needed. The remaining commissioners then compromised and voted to approve a 1.5-percent increase for bus drivers, touching off a rant from Purnell, who listened to the debate from a hallway behind the dais. “You showed me today what you think of us bus drivers,” he said. “You sat up here and voted for a 2-percent increase for county employees and the Board of Education and then you turned around and stabbed us in the back. That is a total insult.”
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