The civilian structure, read from the Town's own pay plan

We already read your pay plan. Closely.

Everything below is transcribed from the Town of Vienna's published FY 24-25 Pay Plan, the document this study will redesign. The structure's strengths and its pressure points are both visible before award, and the 2024 study's own critique tells us where to look first.

–
Occupied grades, 110 through 134 (plus reserved slots)
~5%
Midpoint-to-midpoint grade progression, per the 2024 study
61%
Open-range width entry to maximum, per the 2024 study
4×6
Maintenance Worker levels × divisions sharing one series today
2
Standalone series the RFP requests: Sewer Construction and Water Construction

What the 2024 study said about this structure

The Town's February 2024 study (Bolton Rewards, final report presented to Council February 26, 2024, public in the Town's Legistar record) described the civilian plan as 25 grades with an average 5.0% grade progression and open ranges 61.0% wide, and concluded the progressions "may be too small" and the widths "too large to effectively manage base pay," with enough overlap that average pay in a lower grade can exceed the grade above. It also found no formal job evaluation system behind grade assignments. That critique is still an accurate description of the current plan, and answering it is the heart of RFP §4.3.2.

What we would keep, and what we would fix

The plan's bones are sound: a published schedule, consistent FLSA flags, class codes, and a workforce small enough to study title by title rather than by sampling. The redesign work is targeted: wider grade differentials that make level distinctions defensible, series and career ladders the titles currently imply but do not formalize, a documented job evaluation method HR can apply to new positions, and hiring terciles updated from the 2024 study's less-than-7 / 7-to-14 / more-than-14-year guidance to today's market.

The civilian open-range structure, grade by grade

Transcribed from the Town's published FY 24-25 Pay Plan (retrieved via the Internet Archive). Bars span range minimum to maximum; the tick is the midpoint. Current-year ranges are these values plus the 2% COLAs documented in RFP §4.1.

Every classified title, by grade

All classification titles from the FY 24-25 plan. The Maintenance Worker rows are the series the RFP asks us to split: one 4-level series currently covering six divisions, including Sewer Construction and Water Construction, each with its own workers-compensation code; the Town's own document already treats them as different jobs for insurance purposes.
GradeRange (FY 24-25)Classification titles

The series-split deliverable, previewed

RFP §4.3.5 asks for standalone Sewer Construction and Water Construction job description series "at appropriate skill/career levels." The current plan runs Maintenance Worker I through IV (grades 112, 114, 116, 117) across divisions with one description series. Division-specific series succeed when they capture real operational distinctions: confined-space and trench work, DEQ-regulated utility operations, licensure and CDL requirements, and the supervisory ladder above them (the plan already has separate Sewer Operations and Water Operations Supervisors at grade 123 and a Water and Waste Water Superintendent at 128, so the top of each ladder exists; the RFP asks us to build the bottom). Parity with neighboring jurisdictions is testable directly: Fairfax County, Loudoun Water, WSSC, and the towns all publish utility-trade classifications.