Women's median pay less than men's at Tulsa City Hall, analysis shows

Most top-paying jobs at Tulsa City Hall continue to be held by men, but there is evidence that women are making inroads to close the salary gap, the Tulsa World has found.

Of 83 full-time city employees making at least $100,000 annually, 60 are men, a World analysis of November city salary data indicates.

The overall median pay for all female city of Tulsa employees was 92 percent of the median pay for male city workers, the analysis shows.

The World’s review of base salaries for all full-time city of Tulsa employees shows women’s median pay to be $48,402 yearly, while median pay for men is $51,168 annually.

This year marks the first time in at least this decade that the median pay for women working for the city of Tulsa was at least 90 percent of men. In prior years this decade, women’s median pay was 80 percent to 85 percent of male employees’ pay, the World found.

The analysis was conducted with individual salary data for city of Tulsa employees that the World has collected each year via state Open Records Act requests.

In 15 of 22 city departments, median pay for women lagged behind that of men.

And while men were paid more than women among Fire and Police department personnel, the analysis found the median pay among sworn Police and Fire department personnel to be equal for both men and women.

The median pay for both sworn male and female police officers was $71,448, while for sworn male and female firefighters it was $49,488. Disparities in overall department pay were realized when support staff were included in the police and fire comparisons.

The wage gap is the widest in Mayor G.T. Bynum’s office, where the median annual salary for men is $111,100, while for women the median salary is $63,776.

The World received the city of Tulsa salary data just before Deputy Mayor Michael Junk left to become Gov.-elect Kevin Stitt’s chief of staff. The appointment of Deputy Chief of Staff Amy Brown as Junk’s replacement will help close the payroll gender gap in the Mayor’s Office.

City officials, meanwhile, have finished work on an equal pay policy that will correct pay disparities among employees of all departments with similar job duties.

Implementing the new pay equity policy resulted in salary adjustments for 228 employees, Brown said. The salary increases will cost the city $480,367.83 annually, Brown said.

Sworn Police and Fire department officials, who are represented on salary matters by labor unions, are not included in the city’s pay equity review, Brown said.

The policy is gender- and race-neutral, focusing chiefly on equal pay for equal work, Brown said.

The effort grew out of a meeting of a group of female leaders who wanted to discuss gender equity with Bynum in early 2018, Brown said.

“We want to be a good leader for our own employees in the area of gender equity because we’re trying to be a leader for the larger community,” Brown said.

She drew a distinction between the World’s analysis and the city’s pay equity policy.

“I would just say comparing pay among employees within a single department is not the most accurate way to look at pay equity because every department has administrative personnel; they have technical personnel; they have office staff,” Brown said.

The salary review comes in the wake of a lawsuit settlement between the city and one of its employees who alleged that she was paid less than her male counterparts for doing similar work in the Finance Department.

Jackie Stice, who has worked for the city since 2003, filed the lawsuit on April 10, 2017, in Tulsa County District Court after the city’s Civil Service Commission rejected her claim of gender-based pay inequality.

The case was later moved to federal court.

While a federal judge in Tulsa rejected Stice’s claim that the city discriminated against her in pay, the court did rule that her Equal Pay Act claim could go forward.

After that ruling, she and the city reached a settlement in August that called for her to receive a $90,000 payment and a $10,000 annual base pay increase.

One of the attorneys who represented Stice said the Tulsa World’s findings with respect to disparities in pay between male and female employees were not surprising.

“The city’s pay policies allow for supervisor discretion in assigning pay upon both initial hiring and in promotions,” said attorney Dan Smolen. “Unfortunately in our litigation experience with the city, this subjectivity has resulted in higher pay awarded to males.

“Tulsa World’s findings are consistent with this experience. It is not enough to simply point to a male’s prior salary or starting pay as a justification for the disparity. Many times female employees have longer tenures and more job-related experience and, yet, are still paid less.”

Meanwhile, a recent national study found that Oklahoma ranked near the bottom among states in gender pay equity.

The study, by the American Association of University Women, found that full-time working women in Oklahoma make 77 cents on the dollar compared to men, giving it a ranking of 43rd in the nation.

AAUW Chief Executive Officer Kimberly Churches said gender pay inequity is evident when comparing degreed men and women.

“Women make up 56 percent of the undergraduate population,” Churches said. “So more women are earning degrees than men, but even after earning a college degree and going into a wide variety of different sectors and industries, women with a college degree still are earning 26 percent less than their male colleagues.”

So-called “occupational segregation,” where women are steered into lower-paying jobs, is another component of gender pay inequity, Churches said.

The biggest collective gender gaps are among the higher-paying jobs, the study found.

Among the reasons for pay disparities, studies have shown that men are four times as likely than women to negotiate their salaries, Churches said.

The AAUW has a goal of training as many as 10 million women in salary-negotiation skills, Churches said.

The training promotes the understanding of skills, assets, values and what women bring to the table in their particular area and profession, Churches said.

Churches praised Tulsa officials for undergoing a salary review, calling it a “good effort.”

“I would encourage them to also look at it through a people of color and gender lens, as well, just to make sure you are slicing and dicing the data completely to look at it holistically,” she said.

“That’s a very, very, good step — really promising.”

However, Churches commented on the wide gaps in median pay among some white collar departments and how they contrast with relatively equal pay in departments with lower median pay.

“They are failing in a lot of the same ways,” Churches said. “As you get closer to minimum wage positions, the (gender) gap closes.”

The largest collective gender gaps nationwide tend to be in higher-paying positions, Churches said.

“So the only way to really close that (gap) is to focus not only on the lower-paying (departments) but really going top-down and bottom-up,” Churches said.

A look at the individual departments gives a better understanding for some of the variations in median pay among men and women.

In the Municipal Court Department, 23 of the 33 full-time employees are women. And while the head of the department is a woman, all three full-time judges — the highest paid employees in the department — are male.

Brown cited the Municipal Courts Department as one area where employees perform a wide range of job duties.

In the city Legal Department, the median pay for both women and men is $87,125.

In six city departments, women’s median pay is higher than men’s.

Brown called the city pay equity policy a “first step” for the city.

“Next we plan to look at how we can improve recruitment and professional development pipelines to ensure traditionally underrepresented employee groups have the same leadership opportunities as other employees,” Brown said.

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