State Employees slated for first general pay raise since 1990

Louisiana’s state employees will start seeing a $1,500 annual pay raise in their pay checks beginning next month according to this story in Thursday’s Baton Rouge Advocate.

The raise, the first general increase since 1990, amounts to
72-cents an hour. The pay increase will be retroactive to July 1, the
beginning of the state budget year.

The state Civil Service Commission on Wednesday adopted pay schedules that allow for implementation of the pay increase for some 60,000 classified employees.

Gov. Kathleen Blanco issued an executive order to implement the raise for an estimated 36,000 full-and part-time employees who are in the unclassified
service.

Civil Service Commission member Burl Cain called the pay increase “historic” because the pay raises are a flat amount that all employees will get, not the usual percentage increase.

“We did the flat rate which gives the largest percentage to the folks that make the least amount of money,” said Cain, also warden of Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola.