Chickasaw and Floyd supervisors discuss engineer over phone

Given the option to enter closed session, County Engineer Dusten Rolando chose to keep discussion of his job performance survey and contract for fiscal 2020 in open session when the Chickasaw and Floyd County boards of supervisors teleconferenced on Monday.Rolando, who splits his time between the two counties, said two years ago the boards gave him a 2 percent increase, and last year 3 percent was approved.Rolando compared his salary and benefit package among the eight dual-county engineers in the Iowa County Engineers Service Bureau. He is at $124,391 annually split about 50-50 with each county’s portion at $62,195.40 for fiscal 2019, according to Chickasaw County records. An example of an exception would be that mileage to county-specific events out-of-county are billed to the relevant county. The average among the eight dual-county engineers’ salaries, including Rolando’s, is $130,000. Jan. 22 marked Rolando’s 18 year anniversary with the county, which puts him first on longevity among the eight dual-county engineers, he said later.Of the eight dual-county engineers, Chickasaw and Floyd combined ranks third from the top on structures with 432 bridges. Chickasaw County has 264 bridges over 20 feet long per Department of Transportation classification “because we have those watersheds that come right through,” and Floyd County has 168.The two county pair ranks fourth of the eight on road length with 1,742 miles between them.— For more on this story, see the Feb. 1 New Hampton Tribune.