As President Drake indicated in his message on June 2, the university will continue to honor the commitment to implement the new $15 minimum wage for employees. Pay for eligible employees across all units, including Wexner Medical Center, will increase to meet the new minimum wage starting Aug. 30, 2020.
Eligible staff employees who are currently paid below $15 per hour will receive a pay increase to $15. In addition, the pay of employees who currently earn between $15 and $15.99 per hour will increase to $16 per hour in recognition of their skills and experience relative to other staff moving to the new minimum. Eligible employees are those in regular and term staff positions.
While we recognize that this increase may contribute to even tighter budgets in some offices, we are committed to supporting this minimum wage increase for all of our employees. Our Operations team will be reaching out next week to each area leader and budget proposal development steward to provide the exact figure that will be needed for those in your office who are eligible so you can work this into FY21 budget processes. We know some counties may have already submitted their budgets, and we also understand that many county commissioners are not increasing budgets for salary increases this year.
We did advocate for some central dollars from the university to help meet this budget demand, but we have not received any indication that this will be forthcoming. We were provided the opportunity to be excluded for this round of increases, but we chose not to take advantage of that because it would have delayed our professionals from receiving the increase to this new wage while others in the university received it.
After the area leaders and budget proposal stewards have been able to review the necessary budget needed for this increase, if there are concerns about any fiscal hardships at the county level, please contact me (wilkins.201@osu.edu).