Whitfield County asked for a full job classification and pay study: about 800 employees in roughly 200 classifications, from the Sheriff's Office and E-911 to Roads, the courts and the Tax Commissioner's counter. House Strategies Group built this site before the proposal deadline, from documents anyone can read, so the evaluation committee can check our understanding of the County and try our method before scoring it.
The RFP lists eighteen scope items. They fall into four pieces of work, and the County gets a tool it can keep using at the end of each one. This site shows where that work starts, built before award from documents anyone can read.
A review of the current plan, titles and job descriptions; questionnaires for every employee; interviews with department heads, elected officials' staff and supervisors; desk audits where the paper and the interview disagree. Each class gets a recommended action: retain, reclassify, consolidate, split, retitle, create or eliminate.
A point-factor method built on the eight factors the RFP names, with every weight and level written down so Human Resources can rate a new job the same way in 2030. Then a test of every pay relationship: compression, overlaps, supervisors against the people they supervise. The Method page lets you move the weights yourself.
Benchmark employers proposed for County approval, separate labor markets for public safety and for administrative and technical jobs, market position options with their cost, a new grade structure, every class assigned to a grade, every employee's placement tested, and at least three implementation scenarios. The Market page shows the published pay we found.
Employee input through questionnaires, interviews and focus groups, scheduled around shifts. FLSA, pay equity and ADA review. An electronic Compensation Maintenance Manual, training for Human Resources and County management, and an optional annual salary survey. The Keep It Current page shows what stays behind.
| Item | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Employees in the study | About 800, including 745 full-time, in about 200 classifications on one grade-ordered pay plan | RFP-HR-202601, Attachment A |
| County full-time-equivalent employees | 730 in 2025, up from 504 in 2016; 412 of the 730 are in public safety | FY2025 ACFR, p.147 |
| Fiscal year | Calendar year (January 1 to December 31) | FY2025 ACFR |
| 2026 General Fund | $67,117,933 in spending, with $4,888,626 drawn from fund balance; Fire District fund $14,045,294 and E-911 fund $3,650,964 are budgeted separately | 2026 adopted budget (December 15, 2025) |
| Salary and benefits | "65% of the total budget is salary and benefits" (Chairman Jevin Jensen, millage hearing) | BOC minutes, September 29, 2026 |
| Retirement | ACCG defined benefit plan closed to new hires February 1, 2016; later full-time hires join the ACCG 401(a) plan, with a 457(b) match | FY2025 ACFR |
| Health coverage | Partly self-insured; the 2026 budget charges each department a flat $15,164 per full-time employee | 2026 adopted budget; FY2025 ACFR |
| Elected and constitutional offices | Sheriff, Tax Commissioner, Clerk of Superior Court, Probate Court, Superior Court, District Attorney, Magistrate Court and Coroner | County organization chart (July 2024) |
| Merit system | A Merit System Personnel Board hears appeals; in July 2023 the Board of Commissioners extended merit coverage to Juvenile, Domestic Violence, Drug and Treatment Court staff | BOC minutes, July 10, 2023 |
| Population | 106,212 (July 2025 estimate); 102,864 at the 2020 Census | FY2025 ACFR, citing the Census Bureau |
| Largest employers | Shaw Industries 6,133; Mohawk Industries 4,172; Engineered Floors 3,600; Whitfield County Schools 1,899; Qcells 1,800; Hamilton Medical Center 1,763; the County is ninth at 730 and the City of Dalton tenth at 692 | FY2025 ACFR, principal employers |
| Average wage in the county | $61,197 a year (2025) | FY2025 ACFR |
| Public class specifications | 296 published with ranges; 186 of the 232 usable entries set the maximum at 1.5 times the minimum | NEOGOV, captured October 26, 2026 |
A preview of the study, built only from published documents, each linked where it is used. No County employee data was requested or used. Where a page shows a method on invented numbers (the Method page), it says so. The study itself runs on the job descriptions, pay plan and payroll file the County provides at kickoff.