Idaho Department of Environmental Quality employees who leave the agency on average get a 36 percent pay boost in their new jobs elsewhere, DEQ Director Toni Hardesty told JFAC this morning, and those who go to the private sector see an average salary boost of 51 percent. "It is critical to our efforts to provide good government service that we are able to recruit and retain top-tier state employees," Hardesty told legislative budget writers, urging them to support a boost in state employee pay next year.