The Lincoln County Commissioners approved a cost of living increase for its employees at a recent meeting.

The motion to approve a 2.5% increase for all county employees, excluding those in union positions, was approved unanimously on June 22 for fiscal year 2022-23. The fiscal year begins July 1 and ends June 31, 2023.

Commission Chair Jerry Bennett said he wanted to see county employees get at least 2%. Elected officials automatically receive 1% longevity annually.

“My leanings are to take care of our employees with the costs of everything going up,” Bennett said. “And our insurance costs are up 7.9% and we haven’t passed that along to the employees.”

County Human Resources Director Dallas Bowe, who was happy to see the increase, said the county has hired 56 new employees since the beginning of 2021, which is about half of the entire work force.

“It’s been mostly filling positions of people who retired, but I’m afraid my employees will get remote jobs,” Bowe said.

She also noted at how hard it can be to fill positions when it’s difficult for people to find housing.

Bennett said the county should save money with the retirements, but the loss of knowledge is hard to replace.

County Administrator Jim Hammons presented figures that show, with the 2.5% cost of living increase, the yearly increase in the total salary budget will be about $103,000, up to about $4.2 million.

Hammons said he believes market values will probably increase.

“It’s not going to go down, but it is still too early to receive definitive information from the Department of Revenue,” Hammons said.

The Commissioners also approved bids for road oil, gas and diesel fuel, advertising and gravel crushing.

For road oil, McAsphalt Industries was the only bidder and was chosen to provide for road departments in Libby, Troy and Eureka.

For advertising, the Kootenai Valley Record and The Western News submitted bids. The Western News bids were lower and they were the unanimous choice.

For gas and diesel, Moore Oil was awarded the contract for Troy and Eureka while Golden State was awarded the Libby contract.

Noble Excavating submitted the lone bid and was approved for gravel crushing.

The Commission’s next meeting is at 9:45 a.m. Wednesday, July 6.