The Washington County Board of Health approved wage increases for two of their employees this month.

The board approved to increase the new public health director Emily Tokheim’s salary by $5,000 to $75,000 effective this week. Fiscal Administrator Peggy Wood explained at the Board of Health’s February 17th meeting that Tokheim was approaching 90 days on the job since her hiring at a salary of $70,000 with the board’s intention of increasing her pay to $80,000 given that she has fulfilled a list of professional competencies, “And the board approved to have her salary at the departing previous administrator’s salary as of July 1. So we didn’t really discuss a timeframe as to how and when we were going to get to that amount but what I am coming to ask you today and this was not in the personnel change requests because we did not speak about it specifically in last month’s meeting is getting her halfway there.”

The board also approved increasing 1st Five Coordinator Roberta Sloat’s pay from $30.05 hourly to $34.00 hourly to reflect her 20 plus years of experience in the position. This increase was not approved with the rest of the department’s employee wage increases last month as Sloat has technically only had six years as a fully recognized county employee. Tokheim recommended that they increase her pay to the 20 year level as she has worked for the department for that long, and Board Chair Jack Seward, Jr. shared that he supported this decision as well.