Jonathan Starkey and Matthew Albright

The News Journal

The average annual salary for workers in private business in Delaware is %2436%2C825

Gov. Jack Markell%27s %24171%2C000 salary made him just the 88th highest paid state employee

Of the 1%2C343 state employees who received more than %24100%2C000 in total pay%2C 630 were education employees

At least 267 state troopers from patrol officers to captains made six figures last year

Working for the state of Delaware pays better than you think for many government workers.

More than 1,300 state employees made more than $100,000 last year – among them judges with six-figure compensation, state troopers collecting thousands in overtime pay, and hundreds of school administrators paid some of the highest salaries in Delaware's government, according to state payroll data obtained through an open records request.

Earning six figures in Delaware is pretty good pay in a state where the average annual salary for workers in private business is $36,825, according to the most recent state Department of Labor wage report.

Ekeoma Wogu, a nursing supervisor at the Delaware Psychiatric Center, collected a $60,400 salary, but added nearly $149,000 in overtime pay, making her the second highest paid state employee in 2013.

Topping the highest-paid list is retiring DelTech president Orlando George, who pulled in $469,885, including a $90,000 retirement benefit.

A correctional officer at Sussex Correctional in Georgetown made the six-figures list by working more than 2,000 hours in overtime, an average of 39 hours in OT a week for all of last year. Across state agencies, overtime costs like his have risen as worker ranks have thinned, reaching $47 million last year, up 21 percent since 2009.

Gov. Jack Markell's $171,000 salary made him just the 88th highest paid state employee. Nine cops, seven school district superintendents and 51 judges made more.

Many of the highest paid state workers are judges, high-level bureaucrats and doctors, including four physicians in the medical examiner's office. There are more than 75 judges, magistrates and commissioners on the six-figures list. At least 10 doctors are among the state's highest-paid employees and Markell's 16 cabinet members are on the list.

More than 280 state workers who collected more than $100,000 in total pay last year did not earn a six-figure salary. Some state employees made the list because they worked long overtime hours, others because they collected thousands in "other pay," which can include payouts for accrued sick and vacation time, clothing allowances, training pay and transportation stipends.

Michael Begatto, who represents many of the state's lowest paid employees as head of the Delaware chapter of AFSCME, the public employees' union, said he was "shocked" to learn that more than 1,300 state employees, or about 3.8 percent of the government workforce, collected six-figures in pay.

"It's larger than I would have thought," Begatto said. "Delaware doesn't rank really high when it comes to compensating public employees."

Educators rank high

State lawmakers are considering a budget proposal from Markell that includes several new tax increases, additional taxpayer money needed to finance state government at about $3.8 billion next year. While some of the tax increases would pay for new state programs, some of the money covers increased spending in education and other areas of government.

Markell and others have questioned spending on some state salaries, but overtime pay has increased since Markell's first year in office and many school administrators remain among the highest paid workers in the state.

Of the 1,343 state employees who received more than $100,000 in total pay, 630, or about 47 percent, were education employees, mostly administrators at the local level whose combined pay topped $60 million.

The state has 34,854 benefit-eligible employees, and 18,189, or more than half, work in schools.

Brandywine School District Superintendent Mark Holodick was the state's highest paid K-12 education employee last year, making $214,176, counting $38,695 in what's called "other pay," including a transportation stipend.

Holodick is flanked on the list by 70 other Brandywine employees earning six figures, ranging from supervisors of finance and transportation to 24 assistant principals and 15 principals. The state's two largest school districts, Red Clay and Christina, have 103 and 108 such employees, respectively.

"Brandywine is a large, diverse district. We've got close to 11,000 students from about 10,000 families. We've got about 2,500 employees in 15 schools and four other sites and buildings that we manage," Holodick said.

"It takes a strong team to oversee the operations of a large, comprehensive district. You have to have competent, capable and qualified people who make the right decisions, because, at the end of the day, bad decisions can jeopardize the safety and the future of children."

The biggest categories of these administrators earning more than $100,000 a year are school-level leaders. Across the state, there are 136 assistant principals and 166 principals paid at that level.

In the 2011-12 school year, Delaware paid principals the fourth-highest average salaries in the country, behind New Jersey, New York and Connecticut, according to financial reports submitted by school systems to the National Center for Education Statistics. Those figures do not include Maryland or Washington D.C., and they do not count extra pay besides salary or total experience within the state or district.

'Working around the clock'

William Penn Principal Jeff Menzer said most principals work far more than a standard 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. workday, putting in hours at home to comb through paperwork. Principals and assistant principals are 12-month employees who oversee the creation of each year's schedule; craft safety, evacuation and emergency response plans; handle discipline of students; and maintain a positive school climate.

Principals handle teacher and other staff evaluations, which have become more involved and time-consuming in recent years. They're also the architects of the overhaul of their schools' curriculum to fit tough new academic standards.

Especially at high schools, administrators are often on duty for after-school events, and principals frequently work weekends to cover athletic competitions.

"You're basically working around the clock," said Menzer, who was paid $145,849 last year. "You're where the buck stops. Everything that goes on in your building, you are responsible for."

Red Clay Superintendent Merv Daugherty, head of the state school chiefs' association, said it has become increasingly difficult to recruit principals as their responsibilities increase. Even in the top-paying education position job of district superintendent, the average tenure is only about four years, he said.

"If somebody thinks an administrator is making too much, I'd invite them to go to any school in the state and see what they do," said Daugherty, who was paid $174,931– more than Markell – last year.

Jim Hosley, who studies education finance for the conservative think tank Caesar Rodney Institute, said big federal and state programs like the Common Core and Race to the Top have created a state that is "top-heavy" in administrators and state office staff.

"It's gotten to the point where money is going to this big regulatory agency and it's not going into the classroom," Hosley said. "You've got so many higher ups trying to direct things that the people who are closest to children can't spend any money the way they want to spend it."

Too many administrators?

There are back-room positions in nearly every school district that pay six-figure salaries. Twenty-three on the list work in district-level finance positions; at least 13 manage facilities, buildings and grounds; seven supervise food service; and dozens more fill positions ranging from "general administration" roles to heads of personnel.

A report issued by Lt. Gov. Matt Denn in 2012 found that if all school districts spent as much of their money on "direct educational services" as the top five, the state would free up an additional $21.1 million for classrooms.

"We're still spending too much on administration versus classroom, both at the state level and at the district level," said Denn, adding that districts should explore ways to share administrative functions. Denn received $86,253 last year in state pay.

"It goes without saying that because of the amount of school districts we have, we have a lot of administrators that in a different scenario we wouldn't have or need," said State Auditor Tom Wagner, who estimated in a 2009 report that the state could save $50 million in administrative costs by consolidating school districts.

Wagner received $108,532 last year from the state.

In his first State of the State address in 2009, Markell criticized "duplicative functions" in the state's 19 school districts, saying they were costing too much money.

"I don't think many parents care whether their school district has its own back rooms, staffed with its own team of procurement officers, human resources advisers, lawyers and accountants," Markell said then. "These duplicative functions drive too many of our investments from the classroom to the back room."

Many responsibilities

In an interview last week, Markell said he still believes schools could cut administrative costs without embarking on an often-discussed, controversial plan to consolidate school districts – which would come with its own price tag.

"I think the districts need to continue to look for opportunities to be particularly efficient with their money," Markell said, adding that state spending cuts on transportation and other district-level programs during his tenure were intended to nudge districts to budget more efficiently. "There are certainly savings opportunities available if you share a back office. Those opportunities continue to exist." ​

Daugherty, the Red Clay chief, says many districts already give administrators multiple areas of responsibility.

Take Ted Ammann, Red Clay's assistant superintendent of district operations, who oversees transportation, cafeterias, facility maintenance and construction. If Red Clay were to absorb other districts – or if the state were to consolidate administrators across several districts while keeping them separate – Ammann would likely not be able to continue handling as many different responsibilities, Daugherty said.

That would mean hiring another administrator, probably at a similar salary, to take up the mantles he left behind. Ammann received $144,522 last year.

"You're not going to cut down on the amount of work that needs to get done," Daugherty said.

Daugherty said it's possible the state could save some money through consolidation, but he doesn't believe such a big undertaking would conserve as much as some expect.

"There might be a way to do it, but nobody's put a model together. Nobody's actually said, 'If we put Red Clay together with another district, we'd consolidate A, B and C,'" he said.

Some of the other state employees with high salaries include Markell's education secretary, Mark Murphy, who earned $160,144 last year, and more than two dozen administrators in the state Department of Education.

'A train wreck'

Outside of schools, overtime pay is costing the state – especially in facilities that require 24-hour supervision like prisons and the Delaware Psychiatric Center. And as Markell has thinned executive branch ranks in the last five years, cutting 530 positions by his count, overtime costs have risen from $39.3 million during his first year in office to $47.7 million last year.

Markell says he did not create an overtime problem, pointing out that state overtime pay is down from $53.4 million in 2007, when Gov. Ruth Ann Minner was in office.

The Department of Correction spent $18.7 million on overtime in 2013 to staff the state's near-capacity prisons, up 40 percent since 2009, payroll data shows.

At least four correctional officers made six figures in total pay thanks to thousands paid in time-and-a-half overtime. Three worked at Sussex Correctional Institution in Georgetown, the fourth at Gander Hill in Wilmington.

Mark Reid, a correctional officer in Georgetown, took home $103,636 in total pay, despite only earning a $36,000 salary. The balance of his pay – about $62,450 – came from the 2,028 hours he worked at his overtime rate.

It's not uncommon for correctional officers in state prisons to double their salaries with overtime earnings. Blame low staffing levels, says Geoff Klopp, head of the state's correctional officers' union.

"I've been begging the governor's office for more full-time positions. They could give two craps about us," Klopp said. "For them, it's cheaper to pay overtime than to have a full-time employee with sick time and vacation. Instead, they want to break the back of correctional officers. It's a train wreck and nobody wants to talk about it."

'Something has to change'

As of last week, 129 correctional officer positions remained vacant, with the state losing 10 more each month, outpacing new recruits. Low starting annual salaries, about $32,000, and around-the-clock hours turn many away from the work, officials say.

Correction Commissioner Robert Coupe said state officials are exploring ways to reduce the reliance on overtime to staff state prisons. But high turnover and low staffing levels continue to cause pressure.

"There's a line somewhere and I'm trying to identify it, where we get to the point where we can't sustain this on overtime," said Coupe. "Something has to change. I'm watching for that."

Coupe's $220,911 pay last year included more than $103,000 in other pay after retiring as superintendent of the Delaware State Police in December 2012, and nearly $110,000 as head of corrections, a job he started in March 2013.

Some correctional officers are forced to work overtime shifts to account for low staffing levels; others volunteer for the shifts to make additional money. High overtime pay also results in long-term obligations for state taxpayers. Correctional officers, like most state employees hired before 2012, when new pension rules took effect, can use overtime pay toward their pension calculations.

Wagner said the state has become too reliant on overtime shifts in around-the-clock facilities like prisons and hospitals, which he worries can create safety hazards.

"For as long as I've been auditor, the overtime situation has been a problem," Wagner said. "The problem is if you're pulling double shifts on a regular basis, over time that's going to affect your work productivity."

Off-duty jobs

Coupe and Markell said the state faced specific challenges in 2013 that resulted in higher overtime: a surge of new prisoners, 30 correctional officers deployed with the Delaware National Guard at the end of last year and construction projects that required additional staffing.

"We're trying to make sure our facilities are safe, and we're doing so at the best possible value for taxpayers," Markell said.

Correctional officers aren't the only ones pulling in big money by working hours at time-and-a-half. At least 267 state troopers from patrol officers to captains made six figures last year, including the executive office, with 156 of them collecting more than $20,000 in overtime pay.

Most state police overtime is billed to construction companies, retailers and schools hiring troopers for off-hours "special duty" jobs, providing security at high school football games and construction sites, and directing traffic at the Christiana Mall. Troopers are limited to 20 hours weekly on off-duty jobs and volunteer for the shifts, and get paid their overtime rate.

Sgt. Paul Shavack, a state police spokesman who received $118,771 in total pay last year, said the outside work program is "closely monitored by the state police leadership to ensure we put well-rested troopers on the road." Shavack's pay last year included $19,170 in overtime.

The Delaware Department of Transportation pays to station troopers at some road construction sites. In 2012, an agency spokesman said the average daily cost to station two troopers at Del. 1/I-95 project at the Christiana Mall for an average of 18 hours a day was $1,658. Construction at the interchange lasted nearly two years.

Unlike other state employees, troopers cannot use their overtime pay to increase their pension payments.

"These are troopers who are willing to give up time at home, time with their families, to go out and work these extra duty jobs. That's a decision they make and their families make," said Tom Brackin, president of the Delaware State Troopers' Association, the troopers union. Brackin received more than $29,000 in overtime last year, in addition to his $114,600 salary, mostly working off-hour security shifts.

Melissa Nann Burke contributed to this story.

Contact Jonathan Starkey at (302) 983-6756, on Twitter @jwstarkey or at jstarkey@delawareonline.com. Contact Matthew Albright at malbright@delawareonline.com or at (302) 324-2428.

Key Numbers

47 percent: State employees receiving $100,000 or more working in education

267: State Troopers and other police employess paid $100,000 or more

$47.7 million: amount state paid in overtime last year.