Richard Rolke - Vernon Morning Star Published: January 18, 2012 1:00 AM
The wage freeze continues at city hall. Vernon council will defer a scheduled increase for committee meeting pay for one year. “We all need to be responsible,” said Coun. Brian
Quiring of the decision. “We have a tough budget to make work and I
don’t feel good about taking an increase.” The previous council decided last fall to
increase committee pay from $137 to $320 for full-day meetings and to
$160 for meetings four hours or less in length. The deferral comes a week after Mayor Rob Sawatzky didn’t accept a scheduled salary increase (from $63,466 to $66,266) for 2012. Coun. Bob Spiers says refusing a committee pay raise reflects the economic conditions facing many residents. “It cuts down on costs. It’s less cost to the taxpayer,” he said. Council members don’t have to submit for meeting pay, and Quiring says he won’t pursue payment. “Given what we’re facing with the budget, I wouldn’t feel good about it,” he said. Quiring says there was no council discussion
about cancelling meeting pay and he is quickly gaining respect for what
the position entails since being sworn into office in December. “It’s a huge amount of work to be a councillor
and there’s more time than I expected,” he said. “Last week, I was at
council all day Monday, Thursday and Friday. If people think it doesn’t
occupy a huge amount of time, they are mistaken.” Council continues to develop a 2012 budget. Initially, it would have taken a 4.69 per cent
tax increase to cover everything in the document, but that has now been
reduced to 3.7 per cent. “There will be more work on it over the next few weeks and we will see what we can do,” said Sawatzky. Council has established a tax hike range of zero to 2.3 per cent.
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Don Quixote Note: For clarification, the meetings on Monday, Thursday and Friday were the Regular Meeting of Council (Every 2 weeks) or the COW (Committee of the whole) meetings held every 2nd Monday or special COW meetings for the budget (Thursday & Friday). Council and Mayor can NOT claim for these meetings; it is part of their base salary per year. The committee meetings where a Councillor can claim are committee meetings such as Finance, Communities in Bloom, TDM meetings. Affordable Housing etc. (The 13 committees eligible are at http://www.vernon.ca/index.php/council/committees)
For 2012 the Committee pay that can be claimed for these committees is $137 per meeting. The budget for 2012 has remained at $22,335. Any unclaimed amount at year end will be transferred to a Council meeting reserve to be used to augment the Community Grant reserve. There is $9,946.05 left in there from the 2010 unclaimed Committee meeting pay (11,728.19 was paid from here in 2011 for the O'keefe Ranch Water connection). This reserve will be increased by the unclaimed amount in 2011 (to be determined shortly).
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Solidarity with cash-strapped Vernonites is all the rage at city hall. Mayor Rob Sawatzky has refused to accept a $2,800 pay
hike as a way of standing shoulder-to-shoulder with citizens during
tough economic times. Not to be outdone, council has taken a year-long
deferral on an increase in committee meeting pay from $137 to $320 for
full-day sessions and $160 for meetings less than four hours long. “It cuts down on costs. It’s less cost to the taxpayer,” said Coun. Bob Spiers of the decision. That’s definitely the case but if council wants to
sharpen pencils, why was there no discussion on scrapping committee
meeting pay altogether? A total of $22,335 was allotted in the 2011 budget for
committee pay (the actual so far is $9,222 because the deadline to file
claims hasn’t occurred yet). To keep things in perspective, that $22,335 — which is
being budgeted again in 2012 — would virtually cover the additional
$27,000 being sought for pothole repairs. When committee meeting pay was first initiated in 2009,
it was justified as a way of recognizing the true workload facing
officials. “There is increasing demand from the public that they be involved in decision-making,” said Buffy Baumbrough, a then-councillor. She also pointed out that most committee meetings are
during the day when councillors are generally focused on their private
careers. “It is onerous and has had an impact,” she said. There’s no question that the time commitment is
substantial. Beyond just sitting at meetings, which can drag on for
seemingly ever, there are the countless hours that go into reading
agendas and background information. Serving on council can be extremely challenging for
anyone who runs their own business or is a working stiff for someone
else. And of course there is the time away from family activities. But the mayor already receives an annual salary of
$63,466, one-third of which is tax-free, while each of the six
councillors pockets a yearly wage of $20,473 (one-third tax-free). The time of individual council members obviously is
important and they shouldn’t be penalized financially for serving the
public, but being elected is not supposed to be about the money. It should be mentioned that most of the city’s
committees also include residents of the community, many of them
businesspeople who face the same time and financial constraints as
councillors. The difference is the community members are volunteers and
they don’t collect one dime for their contributions. Last week, council put off a decision on a staff request for $7.9 million for capital works. “There may be projects that we don’t agree with,” said Coun. Catherine Lord. “We will go through it and see if these are priorities for council.” While trying to tighten the belt is admirable, council
appears unwilling to make any personal sacrifices except for deferring
pay hikes for a year. That’s a far cry from many taxpayers who have had
any hopes of a raise deferred year after year since the recession began
in 2008. The $22,335 in meeting pay isn’t going to make or break
city coffers, but it would indicate to residents that elected officials
truly understand their financial plight. Of course, the City of Vernon isn’t in a unique situation. In Coldstream, council members are paid to attend meetings they can only observe because they aren’t appointed to the committee. Not only does this policy reveal little faith in the
councillors named to the committees to report back to their colleagues,
but it raises questions as to how tax dollars are spent. But we shouldn’t protest too loudly. After all, who wouldn’t want to receive a paycheque without actually being required to do something for it?
Richard Rolke is the senior reporter for The Morning Star
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