COEUR d'ALENE - The public gets a chance to be heard tonight on Kootenai County's proposed 2015 budget of $79.6 million.

There is no tax increase planned, but a total of $1.3 million is proposed for county employee wage increases.

Commissioner Dan Green said Tuesday that the county has spent two years trying to bring pay scales into what officials believe are the market levels.

"We couldn't do everything in one year; it was too much money," Green said.

Pay ranges were adjusted upward last year.

"What that created was what we call (wage) 'compression,'" Green said.

Employees who didn't get a pay increase last year through the pay-range adjustments will now get a bump, Green said.

This wage compression issue fix will cost the county an overall total of $731,000 in a one-year timeframe, Green said.

The county also has budgeted approximately $569,000 for merit-based pay increases, awarded by the county's elected and appointed department heads, Green said.

"They can take their wage pool of money and give everybody a percent, or they could give 5 percent to one person and 0 percent to another," Green said.

The department heads and elected officials like the freedom to reward the top performers on their staffs, Green said.

The $1.3 million in raises will be paid for with revenue from new construction.

The overall proposed budget for 2015 is larger than the current adopted budget of $75.1 million.

The county is conducting the budget hearing tonight starting at 6 p.m. at the county administration building at 451 N. Government Way.