Thursday, October 1, 2026
The Tumwater Budget and Finance Committee approved a slate of proposals to enhance the benefits of certain city employees.
During a meeting on Friday, March 27, the committee reviewed the proposals and agreed to place them on the council’s agenda for approval at a May 5 meeting.
Administrative Services Director Michelle Sutherland explained to the committee that the proposal involves non-represented employees, or workers not covered by bargaining agreements.
She added the proposals are being recommended to match the benefits of comparable jurisdictions, such as Bremerton, Longview, Maple Valley, Mount Vernon and Port Angeles, among other cities.
Sutherland said the first recommendation is to increase the vacation accrual schedule. Vacation accrual currently begins at eight hours per month for city employees, so the proposal would update the schedule to better align the city with comparable jurisdictions.
The second recommendation is to increase the number of floating holidays from one to two. Sutherland also recommends increasing the number of fixed holidays from 11 to 12 by adding Christmas Eve.
The final recommendation is to introduce one day of community service leave, which employees could take to volunteer with local nonprofits and schools. Sutherland noted that among comparable jurisdictions, Maple Valley is the only one to offer a day of community service leave.
After Sutherland’s presentation, Council Member Angela Jefferson asked whether staff is exploring how to better help employees with the costs of child care. Jefferson noted the city could consider providing child care assistance accounts.
Sutherland said the city offers a dependent care account, which allows employees to set aside pre-tax income to utilize for child care.
Jefferson suggested the city could also explore matching employee contributions up to $200 every month for the account.
Council member Kelly von Holtz added to the topic, saying such benefits must be viewed through an equity lens considering not all employees have children.
Von Holtz pointed out other public agencies offer such types of accounts that can be used for more than child care. Jefferson agreed, adding the account can also be spent on pets.
City Administrator Paul Simmons said he appreciated the comments and added that the city could explore additional options in the year.
He also recommended conducting an inventory of available options involving human resources, as well as the parks and economic development departments, to address child care not just as an issue for city employees but as a community-wide issue.
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Wesley
What is the reason public money is demanded for private childcare?
Tuesday, April 7 Report this
gordixie
If the committee is serious about improving employees living standards and benefits, they should do the right thing and MANDATE THAT ALL EMPLOYERS IN TUMWATER adopt these same standards. How dare you use taxpayer money to fund your benefits without using your leverage to secure the same benefits for the rest of the working class in Tumwater. A rising tide lifts all boats.
Wednesday, April 8 Report this
OlyBlues
Here we go again, city of Tumwater council spending like drunk sailors. This is becoming a bad dream for Tumwater taxpayers. The excess in taxes must be burning a hole in the pockets of city officials while residents suffer. Now they want to subsidize their child care too? Guess what? Absolutely not my responsibility to pay for in addition to your $30-40K defined public employee benefit package.
The city just paid $1.4 million for their extravagant park lodge, funded a new $7K/month arts coordinator, unnecessarily promoted the communications manager to a director position so he could be richly rewarded an extra $50K a year, and now wants to spend more money to bolster city employee wages despite these employees accepting the job at their current salaries, benefits, and pay scale that includes raises. Where is the fiscal restraint? Mayor Dahloff is running a very reckless operation here.
Wednesday, April 8 Report this