By Jim Cline and Kate Kremer
In part 4 of our on-going wage series, we now turn to the rankings of County Deputy Sheriff and City Police Officer rankings throughout the State. This series always produces both expected and unexpected information about the relative standing of jurisdictions.
In this article will provide you some discussion of the wage rankings but for the full rankings, you’ll need to explore our Premium Website [link to description of website on our free website]. If you’re not currently a Premium Website subscriber you can review our services Cline and Associates Premium Information Services and contact Carly Alcombrack at Cline and Associates and she’ll explain how you can become one: CAlcombrack@clinelawfirm.com. For current premium subscribers below are links to some of the additional available Police and Deputy Wage Rank reports:
Police Officer 5 Year No Degree 2023 Ranking
Police Officer 25 Year BA 2023 Ranking
Deputy Sheriff 5 Year No Degree 2023 Ranking
Deputy Sheriff 25 Year BA 2023 Ranking
To review the position for you and your comparables, review the full rankings on the Premium Website. In reviewing that data, we find some of it noteworthy. Some for County Deputies:
- King County remains at number 1 by a significant margin at the 5 year and 25 Year BA level.
- King County is followed in order by Pierce, Snohomish County and Kitsap Counties.
- San Juan, one of the smaller counties, ranks 11th on the 5-year list and 8th on the 25-year BA pay level. Spokane, the fourth largest county in the State, ranks number 15 at the 5 Year level and moves up to 9th at the 25 Year BA level.
- Clark County has longevity and BA premiums that lift it from 16th on the 5-year list to 5th on the 25-year BA list.
Below is a listing of the top 10 ranked 5-year Deputy Sheriff wages for Counties. For the full listing including the 5 year and 25 Year BA ranking of all 39 counties, wages and wage date see the Cline and Associates premium website.
There has been quite a bit of shuffling of this order over the past two years as some agencies have faired relatively better or worse than their comparables in this high-CPI, tight labor market environment. In at least a couple of the “top 10” their placement was boosted by employers voluntarily reopening their contracts to be more competitive.
A review of the city police officer rankings also shows many of the same both expected and unexpected results:
- Seattle’s lagging 2020 wage has not kept up with inflation and it is surpassed by much smaller cities at both the 5 and 25 BA level. Without current year wages, Seattle does not make the top 10 list at the 5 Year or 25 Year BA level.
- Bothell benefited from an advantageous full Seattle CPI increase with no ceiling, vaulting into the top spot
- Kent has gained ranking over the past few years, coming in at 5th at the 5-year level and Second on the 25 Year BA table.
- At the 25 Year BA level Lynnwood drops to 13th and Issaquah jumps into the top 10 ranking at 9th.
- Vancouver, the fourth largest city in the State, continues to lag behind their historic rankings coming in with 29th at the 5-year level and bumping up to 17th at the 25 year BA level.
- Spokane continues to lag, now ranked only 59th at 5 Years and 57th at 25 Years with a BA, despite being the 2nd largest city in the State.
- While 96th populated city Black Diamond is ranked 13th for 5 year no degree wage and 24h at the 25 Year BA level.
This data indicates how factors such as Assessed Valuation per capita and not solely population play into wage settlements. Below is a list of the top 10 of 131 Washington cities ranked by their 5 year no degree wage.
For the specific wage numbers, please review the Charts available on our Premium Website. We report the wages for purposes of this summary survey at two levels, 5 year No Degree and 25 Year BA and indicated the wage and last contract year that wage is reported from.
We have performed a more in-depth analysis of these results and compared them to important contributing factors such as Population and Tax Base. In some of the articles ahead in this series, we’ll undertake a detailed review of how those factors may contribute to your wage ranking.
It also has to be noted that these wage rankings certainly do not provide a full picture of total compensation. Renton, for example, does not show on the “top 10” city list yet has a contract which includes a vast array of wage and wage related premiums providing its officers a competitive package. Everett, on the other hand, ranks 4th in their monthly but their standard schedule requires them to additional hours, thereby reducing their hourly wage by over 5%. To accurately assess the strength of labor contract, you’d need to run a detailed total compensation report.
