Empire Township hosted its annual meeting on Saturday covering salary resolutions, a fire department report, and a library report.
Empire Township clerk Christine Neiswonger received a raise from $34,000 to $42,000. In a previous Enterprise article last week featuring the Empire Township budget, a reporter erroneously stated that the clerk’s raise went from $42,000 to $46,000.
The public had an opportunity to vote for this resolution on Saturday, and it passed with a motion from Diana Oberschulte, and a second from Rob Barnes.
The Michigan Townships Association has encouraged townships to consider increasing the salary of the clerk, according to its 2023 annual report.
“Our clerk has five main funds that she keeps track of and she rarely uses a deputy,” Oberschulte said. “We don’t know how long (Neiswonger) will be in office and we have to plan and be ready for if she were not to run or for some reason not serve.”
Barnes who seconded the motion had this to say: “She cares for the job and I see the hours that she puts in, we’re here until way late in the evening making sure that election results get tabulated correctly,” Barnes said. “One of the things that we’re seeing is that the pace of the market and the value of these jobs and what we’re paying local workers here in the empire is not keeping pace with what the market is doing with ... You are going to find out that the wages are not high enough to attract talent into empire to do these responsible jobs.”
