By April Bethea
abethea@charlotteobserver.com

Harry Jones

Mecklenburg commissioners unanimously approved a pay raise Tuesday for County Manager Harry Jones, saying he had met or exceeded some goals set in the past year.

Jones' new base salary will be $246,138, an increase of 1.5 percent over last year. But his overall compensation will go up by 5 percent, for a total of $297,795.

The compensation increase is largely because the board restored a match to Jones' retirement plan, which is valued at $7,384 this year. The money was cut a year ago because the county had frozen matches for other employees in deep budget cuts.

The retirement matches, as well as merit increases, were restored for county workers for the budget year that began July 1.

Commissioner Dumont Clarke, who chairs the board's compensation committee, said the board "really considered everything that's happened in the past year."

56 percent of county goals met

On the positive side, Clarke noted the county scored "green lights" on 56 percent on its performance goals. That means the county either achieved or came very close to the goal.

He also said Jones had accomplished all seven projects in his strategic plan for the year and demonstrated leadership, in part, by his recent election as president of the N.C. City and County Management Association.

But commissioners also privately discussed a board reprimand of Jones earlier this year related to a $60,000 settlement to the county's former area mental health director. While the board ultimately said the deal was in the county's best interest, they said Jones erred by not telling them about the money earlier and for leaving the public with a misleading impression about the final pay.

The board also said Jones erred in releasing "privileged information" about money given to former Sheriff Jim Pendergraph - now a commissioner - after his retirement from the county.

Child support update

Also Tuesday, county officials celebrated the accomplishments made in the past year by the county's Child Support Enforcement department.

The county took over child support enforcement from the state in 2010. The new department handles, among other things, locating parents who owe child support, establishing paternity of children and petitioning for court-ordered support payments.

Director Joan Kennedy said the Mecklenburg office serves more than 48,000 children and currently has nearly 39,000 active cases.

In the past year, she said the office has worked on training workers, implementing the county's customer-service standards and increasing collaboration with other departments and agencies. The office also digitized all 48,000-plus of its case files, so employees can access those records more easily when they're working off-site.

Kennedy said officials recently learned Mecklenburg and other child support agencies had received a grant to develop a subsidized employment program for noncustodial parents who owe support.

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