PLANT CITY, Fla. — Plant City is seeing a big population boom, and local leaders are aiming to grow the workforce by providing pay increases to city staff.

What You Need To Know

Plant City is raising pay for city employees to remain competitive with surrounding areas

Increased pay aims to retain current employees and attract new hires

The fire department hopes to benefit from these changes with new hires and better service coverage

City Manager Bill McDaniel said the pay increases are needed to remain competitive with surrounding cities. The raises not only help with employee recruitment, but they also help to retain the workers currently on the city’s payroll.

“We’re not just expanding the workforce because there’s an increase in the population,” McDaniel said. “We maintain a very effective ratio, very efficient ratio so that the citizens are getting the best possible bang for the dollar they invest in their government services.”

Plant City Fire Chief David Dittman said it’s an incentive for more people to join the fire department.

“People come here, they love working here, but if they’re offered a job that was paying more money with a better benefit, we were losing people to those competitive markets,” Dittman said. “Now, we’re going to see a big retention.”

The fire department has 59 employees, including administrative staff. This year alone, Dittman said it has added 18 new employees.

“It also allows me to put in another fire engine, which allows me to increase my coverage to the citizens,” Dittman said. “I mean, this place is booming, so we need to be able to cover everything.”

Plant City is seeing a population boom and they’re aiming to grow the workforce. They’re doing this with pay increases, tune in to see how it’s impacting the Fire Department, at 5pm on @BN9 pic.twitter.com/43YAETxku2

— Lizbeth Gutierrez (@LizbethGNews) December 22, 2025

Dittman has also implemented the addition of a 3-week Kelly Day — which is an extra paid day off during a shift cycle. It’s change he has brought about since becoming the fire chief in May.

The work he’s doing was inspired from his father.

“It just reminds me of my upbringing through the fire service and passing it down generation to generation,” Dittman said.

With all these new incentives, the city is looking to welcome more people to the department to serve a growing community.

“We’re just looking to keep increasing our service lines,” Dittman said. “And as we grow with our department, we’ll be able to hit those service lines.”

The pay increase was for all city staff, including solid waste, which the city manager said is a very competitive job and for those who work for the police department too.