Central Greene close to settlement with tax collectors
WAYNESBURG – The five Central Greene tax collectors who sued the district last year after a change in their wages are close to settling their lawsuit.
The school board approved at Tuesday’s meeting an agreement in principle to settle the lawsuit, although it must now be agreed upon by the tax collectors and their attorney, Kimberly Simon-Pratt.
The settlement will then be presented in court, district solicitor Kirk King said, although he declined to further comment on the matter until the settlement was finalized. Simon-Pratt could not immediately be reached for comment.
The lawsuit was filed in April by tax collectors Joan Lemley of Wayne Township, Karen Stockdale of Washington Township, Linda VanDruff of Whiteley Township, Christine Jarrell of Perry Township and Kayla Balint of Waynesburg. The Franklin Township tax collector, Margie Mason, who would have received a $1,879 raise under the previous proposal, was not included in the civil suit.
After the board voted last February to change the salaries so each tax collector would make $5.50 per parcel, four of the six tax collectors attended the next board meeting voicing their displeasure.
Their salaries had not been altered since they were set in 1989 and were changed suddenly without input from the tax collectors, they argued, altered just a day before the deadline to set salaries for the next four years beginning in 2018. The tax collectors had also asked the board for a raise just a month before.
Of the five in the suit, salaries decreased between 23 and 65 percent under the change. The tax collectors argued this was a “grossly substandard wage.”
“This per parcel rate represents an unreasonable rate, and cannot support the work and effort required for the Plaintiffs to fulfill all of the duties of their elected office,” court documents state.
A list of their duties filed with the complaint lists 43 separate tasks tax collectors are responsible for at Central Greene. Salaries for the six tax collectors were originally set at a 1989 board meeting. The agenda filed with the complaint shows salaries ranging between $9,385 for the Washington Township tax collector to $20,000 for the Franklin Township tax collector.
“I’ve been a tax collector for the district for 32 years, and I’ve never gotten a raise,” Stockdale told the board in February after her part-time salary was cut 19 percent last year. “I’ve gone along with that for 32 years. It was just an insult to me to get the cut.”
Board President Andrew Corfont said at the time the change would save the district $22,000 and board members compared their new rate to other Greene County districts.