FAIRHOPE, Alabama—When the City Council adopted the 2012 budget last Monday, it set aside $285,000 to fund possible raises for employees.

Such raises will depend on the outcome of an ongoing study of municipal salaries and job descriptions, as well as the state of the economy and city revenues at that time, council members have said.

The issue of employee raises has been a hot topic since budget and finance committees began work on the budget last May. Discussions among committee members noted that the city, while freezing salaries and new hires at times, did not lay off staff as some municipalities have done during the tough economic times of the past three years.

Topics also included whether across-the-board or merit raises based on performance should be used if raises were approved.

Although a city ordinance passed in 1977 required the establishment of a personnel system with salaries comparable to other pay rates and a system of job classifications and descriptions, the city’s personnel board found during its own informal study that job descriptions were lacking and no comparable pay rate scales existed upon which job classifications and salaries were based.

During the board’s meetings, it noted that anecdotal evidence was rampant that pay rates in Fairhope were higher than in other cities of comparable size.

Evergreen Solutions LLC was awarded the contract earlier this year to conduct a Compensation and Job Classification Study that is currently under way.