GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Green Bay city employees could soon get paid to volunteer.
The city’s personnel committee unanimously passed a proposal Tuesday evening to give city employees three paid days off to volunteer.
Mayor Eric Genrich first pitched the idea on the campaign trail.
“It was an idea that was suggested to me by someone in the nonprofit world and it turned out that Human Resources Director Joe Faulds was already working on a policy like this.”
About 500 employees would be eligible for the 24 paid-volunteer hours per year. Employees with full bargaining rights through a union, like police officers, firefighters, and transit workers, would not be eligible.
Employees would need supervisor approval to ensure the time off would not conflict with job duties.
FOX 11 asked Genrich why it would be more beneficial to taxpayers to pay employees to volunteer instead of having them doing their normal job duties.
“I think it’s proven to sort of improve morale with employees in private sector context. I think we’ll see that here as well. A great percentage of younger employees are really looking for that kind of mission-driven workplace.”
One opponent pointed out that city employees already receive three personal days. He believes those should be used if they want to volunteer. He also questions if the city has too many employees considering they can afford to pay them to volunteer, instead of working.
“I’m more or less interested in the bottom line,” said Mark Steuer, the city council’s president.
“I want to make sure that we’re not short staffing or we’re denying certain functions to citizens, things on that order.”
The Volunteer Center of Brown County connects 180 organizations with volunteers per year. It’s executive director, Eric Sponholtz, tells FOX 11 he likes Green Bay’s plan.
“In the last couple years, we’ve really seen an uptick in the number of volunteers needed to do the job just because nonprofits are ever changing and they need to have volunteers help fill these voids and fill those gaps.”
The full City Council will make the final decision on the paid-volunteer plan next Tuesday.
