By Braden Cartwright
Daily Post Staff Writer
Most Los Altos city employees are working four days a week under a new schedule offered by the city.
Called a “4/10” schedule, employees are expected to work for 10 hours a day, in exchange for one day off each week.
The city doesn’t keep track of what hours employees are working, Human Resources Director Irene Barragan said.
Instead, supervisors are expected to manage the performance of their employees.
“It’s really about ensuring that the body of work is completed,” Barragan said.
Other cities have “9/80” schedules that allow employees to take every other Friday off. In Palo Alto and Menlo Park, City Hall is closed on these days. Los Altos City Council approved a “Total Compensation Philosophy” in March last year that set policies for attracting and holding onto high-performing employees.
The philosophy was a guide in labor negotiations with the Los Altos Municipal Employee Association last year that resulted in the alternative schedule offering.
“We negotiate knowing we all have common goals we want to reach,” Barragan said.
Out of 64 city employees, 58 are working a 4/10 schedule, Barragan said.
Twelve are working a 9/80 schedule, and four are working a usual eight hours, five days a week.
These numbers don’t include police officers, who have different schedules because the department covers the city for 24 hours a day.
Employees can pick which day off to take, and most of them pick Monday or Friday, Barragan said.
City Hall employees are also allowed to work from home for up to two days a week – if their job can be done remotely and their supervisor says yes, Barragan said.
City Hall is still open for five days a week, while the Maintenance Service Center – which is responsible for taking care of parks, trees, sewers and streets – is closed to the public on Friday.
The city also raised salaries and benefits and improved workspaces in the last year. Offices now get organic fruits delivered twice a month, Barragan said.
In 2021, the most recent year for which records were available, here are the top paid Los Altos city government employees, according to Transparent California, a nonpartisan group that charts government compensation. The chart shows that the police, who have different scheduling than the group now getting 4-10, are the highest paid employees.
The first figure is total pay followed by total pay plus benefits.
1. Andy Galea, Police Chief, 256,567, 394,479
2. Scott McCrossin, Police Captain, 220,245, 370,615
3. Ryan Burke, Police Sergeant, 223,411, 352,165
4. Kathryn Krauss, Police Captain, 205,729, 347,152
5. Donna Legge, Recreation and Community Services Director, 216,402, 323,872
6. Brian Jeffrey, Police Sergeant, 191,233, 319,119
7. Dyno Kam, Police Agent, 188,836, 308,659
8. Jessica Vernon, Police Agent, 135,346, 307,833
9. Liz Checke, Police Sergeant, 152,133, 302,642
10. Manuel Hernandez, Maintenance Services Director, 221,009, 301,704
11. Cameron Shearer, Police Sergeant, 152,133, 300,740
12. Aimee Major, Police Agent, 133,687, 297,770
13. Jon Biggs, Community Development Director, 221,009, 295,253
14. Edgar Nava, Police Agent, 135,346, 294,953
15. David Brees, Special Projects Manager, 195,303, 294,884
16. Michael Taylor, Police Sergeant, 152,133, 292,260
17. Eric Bardwell, Police Sergeant, 152,991, 292,132
18. Steven Spillman, Police Sergeant, 152,133, 290,614
19. Jon Maginot, Deputy City Manager, 189,415, 285,328
20. James Sandoval, Engineering Services Director/City Engineer, 211,385, 278,951
21. Levi Lnenicka, Police Officer, 128,915, 277,914
22. Aida Fairman, Engineering Services Manager, 173,377, 271,612
23. Brent Butler, Police Officer, 128,915, 271,015
24. Eric Brooks, Police Agent, 135,346, 270,781
25. Brian Werner, Police Agent, 134,513, 267,655
Thanks for using Transparent California data to illuminate how our government uses our tax dollars.
2022 data collections have started, there are 4600 public agencies in the state so it takes a bit of time to get through them all. If anyone wants to prioritize the collection of data for a favorite agency (like the city of Los Altos) they can do that by sponsoring data collection for them. Just go to their page on our site and click “sponsor.” Sponsored agencies take highest priority.
There is nothing more important in government transparency than seeing how our tax dollars are spent in ways that enrich government employees!
How do these PD salaries stack up against LASD and MVLAUHSD school salaries for teachers, administrators, collateral professionals like counselors, mental health, nurses, etc.?
How do they stack against Silicon Valley tech management, pretty much considered the local creme de la creme of “day job” tech classifications? Sourced from Glassdoor.com, the total compensation (base salary plus bonus, profit share (if any) and bennies) medians are:
$263,522 /yr Director of Engineering
$309,602 /yr Senior Director of Engineering
$312,781 /yr Vice President of Engineering
These tech positions require at minimum 4 years of college for a BS, but more typically, if you want to achieve these levels, you need at least one masters degree and very likely a second one (like an MBA), total extra 4 years.
p.s. not relevant to this topic, but how does a PD Sergeant have higher base and total pay than a Captain? It makes one wonder.
Who is going to police these city workers to make sure that on the days they have to work 10 hours that they actually put in the time? My guess is that they don’t have time cards, and everybody covers for everyone else. In government offices I’ve seen, everybody has a go-along to get-along philosophy and nobody will blow any whistles.