A week after most Normal Town Council members publicly backed the professionalism and ethics of City Manager Pam Reece, the council will consider giving her two retroactive pay raises.
The lump sum in back pay would be about $6,900. Reece made $190,550 in 2019 when the council last renewed her multiyear contract.
The proposal before the council on Monday would give her a raise for 2020 and another one effective in April of this year. Mayor Chris Koos said the budget uncertainties of the pandemic prompted the council to hold off on the annual compensation decisions.
Koos said an executive session to talk about Reece's pay was scheduled before council member Stan Nord questioned Reece's ethics and before the special meeting last week to address Nord's unfounded accusations. Reece's performance review was at the end of March.
Koos said granting retroactive pay raises has happened a few times in both Bloomington and Normal when the councils did not get to that work in a timely way. He acknowledged a 15-month delay in that consideration is unusual, but again referred to the pandemic as the reason for deferring the consideration.
Reece's new annual pay would be $201,000. The pay raise for 2020 would be 2.9% and the increase for this year would be 2.4%. Reece's contract runs through the end of March 2024.
