by KARI BLURTON
Hays Post

Hays City Commissioner congratulated City Manager Toby Dougherty for dealing with “lots of challenges in the community” and voted to give Dougherty  a “one percent cost of living” salary raise at Thursday’s City Commission meeting.

According to Vice Mayor Henry Schwaller the raise is “retroactive” starting December 2013.

Schwaller said the salary increase is coming “very late” into the year because there were several written “evaluations” city commissioners needed to receive before agreeing to the raise.

Schwaller explained not only do the commissioners annually evaluate the city manager’s performance, but many co-workers and others community members who work closely with Dougherty must also submit written evaluations.

The evaluations offered some “constructive criticism”  but  “overall…. were quite good,” said Schwaller.