City Pay

John Briggs at Burlington Free Press is reporting on a discussion at the city council about raising the pay for some city employees. I can see it maybe for a couple of really highly skilled and essential engineering positions- if we're not able to fill them now, but I would be highly skeptical about raising pay for anyone else. Especially Leopold! God no!

When I was on the city council I researched what city councils of comparably sized cities pay themselves, because I felt a civic imbalance between the compensation and resources of the mayor and those of the city council. I'll look in records later to see if I can find that info- but I remember Burlington city councilors made far, far under the average- which I think was around 15K. And this was back in 1996 when I was able to live on $8/hr.

If the city council votes to heap even further resources onto the city's executive branch, while continuing starve itself- the body of the people's most direct representatives, they will not be serving the long term interest of Burlington.

They got a little money this year and people got upset because the Dems hired a lawyer with it. I say good for them. The council should have some back up. God knows the mayor does.

I love Bob Kiss. I think he's doing a great job. But institutionally, the council is supposed to be the civic counterweight to the mayor. In practice- the council gets rolled by the mayor every single time.

Every. Single. Time.