Jason Luciw - Kelowna Capital News Published: March 12, 2010 11:00 PM
West Kelowna’s mayor may have given back his $2,763 raise this year, but the gesture was just window dressing because he and his councillors were making too much money to begin with. Do a little digging and it appears the numbers were massaged to justify giving the mayor an annual salary $6,000 greater than it should have been. Councillors appear to be getting $300 too much this year. Perhaps to some that appears like chump change and hardly worth writing about.
But remember, this is a council that won’t give a permanent $6,100 tax exemption to the food bank, wants out of a program to buy more parkland, folds its parks department into general operations to save a dime or two, won’t scale back a proposed $115 annual registration fee for secondary suites to $75 and went cheap on municipal entry signs on Highway 97. And keep in mind, there really are councils out there that are willing to sacrifice salaries for the sake of services. But, in true political fashion, when it’s time to set their own salaries, West Kelowna council members seem to have found a policy where numbers can be fiddled with in order to produce pay increases. As a matter of principal, council should be as frugal with its salaries as it is with everything else.
Council’s policy states that, “In selecting the (B.C.) municipalities for comparison purposes, three municipalities have been identified as those closest to (West Kelowna’s) population greater than 28,500: Campbell River, Penticton and Vernon; and three municipalities closest to Westside’s population lower than 28,500: Langley, Port Moody and North Cowichan.” When the median mayoral and councillor salaries were taken from these municipalities, the mayor would have earned $60,853 this year, compared to $58,090 last year. Councillors’ compensation went from to $20,654 from $20,502. The problem is, the assumptions were incorrect and Penticton and Vernon should never have been placed in the equation. Based on the policy, Courtenay and Langford on Vancouver Island should have been used instead.
Inconveniently for West Kelowna’s mayor and council, Langford and Courtenay pay their mayors and councillors far less, and adding them into the mix would have skewed the numbers significantly for this council. Langford, with a population of 26,000 pays its mayor a mere $33,204 per year and there was no raise given this year. Its councillors get $15,607. Like West Kelowna, Langford is a relatively new municipality, less than 20 years old. That combined with its population make the community a good comparison for West Kelowna.
Courtenay, with a population of 24,000, pays its mayor $46,138 and its councillors get $19,839. Had these numbers been added to the formula as they should have been, West Kelowna’s mayor would be making only $54,888 and councillors would be getting $20,337.
Given these findings, it’s clearly time that a new light be shed on council’s remuneration policy––one with a taxpayer’s touch. Council must do the right thing and appoint an independent committee, kept at arm’s length from municipal staff and local politicians, to examine remuneration. After all, it’s much harder to make a case against compensation when those paying the bill are setting the salaries.
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