Top community worker paid £40k

MOST Londonderry community workers paid out of the Department of Social Development’s (DSD) Neighbourhood Renewal fund earned more than the average wage between 2009 and 2011 with one state funded employee taking home a handsome £41k-£44k.

The Sentinel can reveal that hundreds of state-funded community workers were being paid more than what the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) calculated to be the median gross annual income in the city in 2010 (£18,699).

And the paper has learned that dozens of community workers in the city earned between £10k and £20k more than this median wage over 2009/10 and 2010/11 alone.

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One post at the Resource Centre in Carnhill was listed by DSD as having an annual salary payband of £41k-£44k.

The Londonderry Travellers Support Group is also listed as having a top job paying £34k-£37k from the public purse.

Almost twenty other community workers were paid salaries whose pay bands hit the £30k mark at least at the upper limit.

For example, two workers at Triax - the Neighbourhood Partnership Board for the Fountain, Bogside, Brandywell, Creggan and Bishop Street - were paid over £30k a year.

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One was paid £34k-£37k for ‘technical assistance,’ the other was paid £31k-£34k for the Triax Escape project

Other £30k plus paybands were listed for: Galliagh Development Trust (£31k-£34k); Ballymagroarty/Hazelbank Community Partnership (£31k-£34k); Galliagh Community Development Group (£29k-£31k); Greater Shantallow Area Partnership (£31k - £34k); Currynierin Community Assocation (£27k-£30k); Liberty Consortium Pennyburn Inclusive Playtrail (£27k-£30k); Waterside Area Partnership (£27k-£30k); Dove House Community Trust (£29k-£31k); Creggan Country Park Enterprises Ltd. (£29k-£31k); Top of the Hill 2010 (£29k-£31k); Dunluce Family Centre (£29k-£31k); Community Restorative Justice (£29k-£31k); Gingerbread NI (£27k-£30k); and Rosemount and District Welfare Rights Group (£29k-£31k).

Two posts at the Western Health and Social Services Board (WHSSB) were also funded with paybands hitting £30k.

One was for Neighbourhood Renewal SKills Enhancment (£27k-£30k); the other was for Neighbourhood Health Improvement Project (£25k-£34k).

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Other posts at Hillcrest House Ltd. (£27k-£28k) and Bloody Sunday Trust Museum of Free Derry (£27k-£28k) attracted salaries in the high £20k range.

In a Freedom of Information release to the Sentinel DSD revealed that the vast majority of community workers funded under the Department’s Neighboruhood Renewal fund were paid well over the average wage in the city.