For nine years, 31-yearold Markos Duron spent his days repairing streets as an employee with the City of Kingsville’s Public Works Department.

The job was tough, especially during the days when the heat was at its strongest in South Texas, but it was a steady paycheck with health benefits – a good thing for a man with a wife and son. But last year, Duron followed in the footsteps of a number of city employees who have been lured by the call of the booming oilfield business.

“It was time to do something new,” he said. “I’d already done everything I could with the city.”

Duron works as a wire line operator for Weatherford Wire Line Services, an oil well company in Alice. He moved to San Diego in April after leaving the city’s employment one month earlier.

Since Oct. 1, 23 city employees have left their positions to take advantage of work in the oilfield or other higher paying fields, Human Resources Director Diana Gonzales said. Gonzales presented a study on Monday to the Kingsville City Commission highlighting difficulties the city faces in terms of competing with other public entities and private companies when it comes to employee salaries.

“We don’t have that many positions that we can afford that many vacancies,” City Manager Vincent Cappell said while speaking to commission members Monday.

The study was limited to worker salaries in the city’s Public Works, Animal Control and water departments, city officials said. Cappell said those are the areas that would likely need to be focused on with regard to any future studies on possible salary adjustments.

“Those are the workers that probably make the least in the city,” Cappell told the commissioners. “I don’t want to make your jobs tougher, because it’s tough enough, but if we’re going to address employee salaries, then in some cases, maybe that’s the right place to start.”

In a comparison with 13 cities of similar size throughout the state, only one paid less for employees with industrial qualifications, such as heavy equipment operators, sought after by oilfield employers or other businesses. For instance, equipment operators in classifications I to III range in starting salary from $8.74 per hour to $11.88 per hour with the City of Kingsville. Harker City, with a population of 26,700, had hourly pay for those same positions ranging from $12.81 to $13.85.

Heavy equipment operators, like dump truck drivers or backhoe operators, can make up to $40,000 per year or more working in the oilfield industry, according to the U.S. Department of Labor’s website.

“It appears to us that with the oil field hiring, we’re competing with wages,” Cappell said. “Are we paying our employees something that’s competitive in the marketplace so that we can keep our employees and not lose them to other private employers or public employers?”

‘Money’s not everything’

Fifty-three-year-old Avelino “Ava” Valadez is familiar with the problem the city is facing with its high turnover rate due to higherpaying fields. As the supervisor for the city’s street department, he has seen 13 employees come and go since March of last year. Aside from a couple of terminations, the bulk of those workers left for better pay somewhere else, with five of those going to work in the oilfield business, Valadez said.

It’s understandable, Valadez said, that many of the workers, especially those with experience, who leave are trying to do right for themselves and their families. The downside comes when it’s time to replace those vacancies with new hires.

“These newer guys are not experienced,” Valadez said, adding that it can be a liability, especially considering much of the department’s work involves the use of heavy machinery and hot asphalt.

“Let’s say, for example, you have somebody in the oilfield getting $20, $18 or even $16 an hour, and he’s an operator,” Valadez said. “You bring him to the city and you put him down for $10 an hour. In other words, where are you going to get a good, experienced operator for the price that the city’s paying? That’s hard.”

Valadez said he has seen employees hired on with the city complete their training, with some being reimbursed by the city to obtain their Commercial Driver’s Licenses, then turn in their resignation after finding employment somewhere else. Sometimes all that happened within just a couple of weeks of the individual being hired, he said.

“All of these guys are good guys, they’re good workers,” Valadez said. “It’s just the money.”

Valadez said he has opted to stay put primarily because of his family and connection to the community, particularly as a lifelong resident of Kingsville. He and his wife have a 10-year-old daughter, and Valadez said he cherishes every moment and special occasion he gets to spend with them. He also spends time with his parents, as his father is currently in the midst of battling cancer.

“Family’s important to me – that’s why I don’t go looking for oilfield (work),” Valadez said. “It’s not easy, and I’m not getting any younger.”

“Money’s not everything,” he added.

Fifty-eight-year-old Rudy Mendez, who has been a city employee for 38 years, is a foreman with the Wastewater Department. He shared Valadez’s sentiment on choosing to stay in Kingsville and the city’s employment for so long.

“I enjoy my work and I enjoy helping people,” he said. “Somebody’s got to do it.”

Valadez said oftentimes those workers operating behind the scenes – like laborers or maintenance workers – get overlooked, even though the services they provide and the jobs they do are extremely vital to the city and its infrastructure. He said he hopes the city takes a hard look at the salaries in order to ensure those workers’ pay can be adjusted to match the work they do for the town and its residents.

“It’s about respect,” he said.

As for Duron, he said the move has worked out well for him. He is getting paid more and gets to see his family every day, since he can commute to work. Out-of-town workers aren’t so fortunate.

“Some of these guys go weeks without seeing their families,” he said. “I’m one of the lucky ones.”

The next step

For the city, the process will move on to examining what options are available for city leaders to bring the salary scale for those 94 employees up to par with similar municipalities.

“Whether an outside consultant does the study, or we do it internally, I think it needs to be done,” Cappell said. “I think we need to find out where we are.”

One preliminary option, which would increase those selected salaries all at once by anywhere from $1.15 to $4.24 per hour, has an estimated cost of $435,210, according to Gonzales’ study. This includes the increase in base wages and benefits.

A secondary option would implement the adjusted raises in a more incremental process, with hourly pay rate increases ranging from 36 cents to just under $2. That proposal has a price tag of $234,163, according to the study.

Those increases would be paid for using a combination of general and utility funds, Cappell said.

“You have all kinds of options,” he said. “I don’t think doing a study forces the city commission, really, to do anything – it’s just information. But if we’re going to go through the effort, I think we can give you several options on how to get there. Really, it’s up to you how fast you want to get there.”

City Commissioner Stanley Laskowski said the city faces an uphill battle competing with private industry in the salary department.

“You’re going to lose people to other employers because they can always pay more than you,” Laskowski said. “It’s pretty tough to say we’re going to come up and be competitive and we don’t have the source of revenue to be competitive with those folks in the oilfield business.”

City Commissioner Al Garcia agreed that the city should be cautious in how it spends any money that is currently in surplus. He said the benefit of increased sales tax revenue from the oilfield activity could go away at any time if the industry slows, meaning the city should not make any changes with the expectation that the revenue will always be there.

“The county had that kind of luxury years ago when the oil production was high,” he said. “They relied on that revenue, and then it went and skydived. Then you’re in trouble – that’s another aspect of that. It’s a balancing act in the end.”

However, Cappell countered that there could be a number of areas the city could look at to generate extra revenue to pay for the salary adjustments. He pointed to the lack of some landfill fees or charges for brush pickup as examples.

“The money is the most important tool,” Cappell said. “If you don’t have the money…you really have no reasonable way to (make changes).”