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Emergency Services Director gets pay hike with added duties

Noel Guttman

MAYVILLE — Chautauqua County is merging two positions into one and giving that person a raise.

During last week’s meeting of the county Legislature, lawmakers unanimously approved a local law amending the salary of the director of emergency services. Noel Guttman, who currently holds that position, will add the title of workplace safety manager.

The local law was not discussed during the full legislature meeting; however, during previous committee meetings, County Executive PJ Wendel noted that the safety coordinator position that had been recently established was vacant, due to that person taking another job. Wendel said he discussed the position with Guttman, who felt that he could handle the duties of both jobs.

“He has a lot of great ideas, great plans already,” Wendel said.

Wendel also added that this type of merger is common. “There’s several other counties that use their emergency services director as workplace safety already so we felt this is a continuation of what other counties are doing,” he said.

According to the local law, the salary range will be from $67,272 to $103,302. Wendel said this will be a savings because the county will only pay for benefits for one person instead of two and that they will not be using all of the salary originally budgeted for the workplace safety coordinator.

Wendel said Guttman has some plans already in place to increase workplace safety. He is going to be working with the highway and transportation department. He’s also going to be looking at the safety of each county building, minimizing risk. “I’m excited about it. I think it’s going to be a good opportunity,” Wendel said.

The local law was unanimously approved.

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