Riverside trustees voted 5-0 on Aug. 17 to accelerate a pay bump for Village Manager Jessica Frances, which was supposed to hit the books on Jan. 1, 2024.
Frances’ salary was raised 2.5% from $199,610 to $204,618, retroactive to Aug. 1. In addition, the village board will give Frances another 2.5% salary increase on Jan. 1, 2024, which will boost her pay to $209,734.
She’ll get another scheduled 2.5% raise on Jan. 1, 2025, pushing her annual pay to $214,977. Had Frances not gotten the additional pay raise this month, her salary in 2025 would have been $209,724.
Village President Joseph Ballerine told the Landmark the increase in pay was a vote of confidence in Frances.
“Jessica is just an extremely important part of the village, and we wanted to make sure she knows that,” Ballerine said. “It was a good idea at the right time to do it and show our continued commitment to her.”
Frances, 42, was initially hired in 2012 as the village’s finance director. She has been Riverside’s village manager since August 2014, when she was appointed interim manager. She was named to the position permanently in 2015, at which time her salary was $117,500.
Other changes in Frances’ contract include an increase in the amount of money the village provides as a vehicle allowance, bumping it from $500 to $666.67 per month. At one time the village provided a take-home vehicle for its village managers, a practice it abandoned in favor of the allowance in 2015 when Frances was appointed manager.
Another change in the contract is an increase in the amount Riverside pays annually into a deferred compensation plan for Frances. Now the village will pay $19,750 per year in deferred compensation, compared to $15,000 previously. When Frances was hired, the village paid $4,000 annually into that plan.
Frances will also now receive a $375 monthly stipend in lieu of participating in the village’s health insurance plan. That benefit is available to all management employees in Riverside, but it was not previously part of Frances’ contract.
Had Frances sought for her family to be insured through the village, the expense to the village would have been about $25,000 a year.
