The Salem City Council discussed the pros and cons of reimplementing some type of residency requirements for city employees at Tuesday night’s meeting without making any decisions.
Councilman Craig Morton asked for the issue to be on the agenda, noting city employees were not allowed to live outside the city in other places he had lived and would help the city’s housing market.
City Councilman Amy Trout said she saw Morton’s point, but was concerned about how such a requirement would impact attracting future city workers during a time when there is a labor shortage.
City Manager Rex Barbee agreed.
“Current positions, they and their spouses are both employed and kids are in school and it may be there are willing to drive the 45 miles to get to work dependably instead of uprooting the family, schools and making the wife drive further to where she needs to go. I understand that side of it but the Human Resources position is a nightmare.”
Police Chief Sean Reynolds concurred a stricter residency limit could impact the ability to attract police officers as well.
Public Works Director Annette Brushwitz noted there are positions in public works that require a 15 minute response times to emergency situations.
She says employees who want to live further out don’t bid on this positions. City Clerk Bev Quinn remembered the unhappiness before employees were allowed to live outside the city limits.
“We had a lot of unhappy employees because they wanted to have horses, big gardens, or had a spouse that worked in another town and wanted to live somewhere in between.”
Mayor Nic Farley looked for a compromise.
“All city employees should live within 30 miles if they are new hires. If they are a new hire and don’t live within the city limit they have a set time frame to move in.”
The council ended the discussion with a request to Quinn to determine how many employees currently live more than 30 miles out of town.
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