SAN ANTONIO – They work for San Antonio City Council members, but at least some of them think they should be paid like city employees.
An anonymous group of City Council aides is alleging possible federal labor law violations and has asked for mediation with the city. The request comes as the city has been looking to increase aides’ compensation packages.
The request for mediation came in the form of an Oct. 29 letter from an attorney representing the group, Javier Espinoza. At the heart of the letter are claims that the aides are, incorrectly, not paid overtime and do not receive pay and benefits comparable to city employees.
Espinoza would not say how many people he was representing, only that they came from multiple districts. In the letter, he writes that the aides are worried about retaliation.
The unpaid overtime claim appears to be the basis for the allegations of violations to the Fair Labor Standards Act, which the city has denied.
Espinoza said he believes the aides have been misclassified in a way that prevents them from getting the overtime pay. In the letter, he writes that the goal of mediation would be “to ensure fair compensation for these employees.”
“I think everybody wants what's best for the city,” Espinoza told KSAT in a phone interview. “And so we believe that going into a full-blown lawsuit immediately is probably not the best avenue to try to get positive change enacted, at this point.”
Council aides work for individual council members and are not classified as city employees. Their pay comes out of a pot of money each district receives to pay for staff.
More money has already been set aside in the current budget year to provide a boost to council staff compensation. Following District 1 Councilman Roberto Trevino’s submission of a Council Consideration Request on the issue of pay parity for council aides, an Ad Hoc committee was formed to see how the aides’ compensation stacks up against City of San Antonio workers and council aides in other cities.
“We want to make sure that that bucket of money that we have is matching the amount of work that is being done,” said Trevino, who is also a member of the committee.
Trevino said the goal is to implement “appropriate compensation” by Feb. 1, 2020.
In an email response to KSAT's questions, the city said, “many Council aides have provided input to the Committee to assist in their effort.”
A meeting between the two sides is still being arranged.