DeKalb County nursing home employees to get retention bonus

SYCAMORE – Even though the $8.3 million sale of the DeKalb County Rehabilitation and Nursing Center is off, some employees at the facility will get to cash in on a retention programed spurred by the sale process.

Due to a DeKalb County Board resolution in August 2022, any center worker with employment beginning Aug. 1, 2022, was eligible for a $2-an-hour bonus. But that extra payment wasn’t due to be paid until the sale of the county-owned facility to a private buyer.

Employees accrued the retention bonus at a rate of $2 per hour for each our worked, and the program was in effect from Aug. 1, 2022, through “the date of sale,” according to county documents.

Considering that language, it wasn’t immediately clear what would become of the retention bonus program when DeKalb County officials announced the prospective buyers were seeking to exit the sale contract earlier this month. However, according to county documents, county officials recommended the county board pay out the bonus to the employees who’ve stayed.

“In good faith, Staff is recommending that the retention bonus program funds to be disbursed at the end of the sale process – whether or not the sale is consummated – to every DCRNC employee that maintained employment with the County,” wrote county staff in the October DeKalb County Board meeting agenda.

DeKalb County Administrator Brian Gregory said the sale was officially considered terminated Oct. 18.

“With no sale, this clarifies that when the sale process is concluded – which with the termination of the agreement it would coincide with today [Oct. 18, 2023] – it’s honoring that commitment to the employees that expected that this potential bonus could be there, so that’s the recommendation that came from staff,” Gregory said.

Gregory said all 145 full- and part-time employees at the nursing center, including union workers, will receive their retention bonus.

The bonus program was extended to all eligible employees at the nursing center in September 2022, when the DeKalb County Board extended the offer to American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees No. 3537 workers. Previously, it had just been offered to non-union workers.

Kathy Lampkins, a Republican County Board member from District 2, sought Gregory’s confirmation that Oct. 18, 2023, marked the end of bonus program.

“I want to make sure that we’re clear on this. We’re going to pay it out and then we’re done with it. It doesn’t continue,” said Lampkins, who motioned for the bonus program’s hourly rate to be raised $.50 to $2 an hour last summer.

Gregory said she was spot on.

“That’s correct,” he said. “So it’s through the end of sale, and that would be through the end of the sale process.”