City Council Sends Measure To Increase Council, Mayor Salaries To November Ballot

. Our top story on Midday edition would you vote to raise the salary of your San Diego City Council member. That's just what voters will be asked to do on the November ballot. The city council voted 7 to 1 on Tuesday to put a measure on the ballot that would raise the salaries of the mayor the city attorney and each city council member. It would end the stalemate on San Diego city leaders salaries that's gone on for the last 15 years with consultants advising a pay raise. And city leaders reluctant to approve their own salary hikes. Joining me is San Diego Union Tribune reporter David Garrick. And David welcome. Maureen thanks for having me. How much would this raise the salaries of the mayor and the City Council would actually double them over the next four years. So right now city council mayors make city council members make 75000 that would go to 150. The mayor makes 100000 that will go to 200000. So would a vote for this increase. Also establish a continuing process of salary adjustment for the mayor city attorney and council. That's correct they would. Their salaries would be benchmarked against the salaries of Superior Court judges which go up essentially every year based on statewide labor contracts but they go up just incrementally is that right. That's correct yes. Basically like cost of living keep up with inflation roughly 3 percent a year. That's a guess but that's about right now San Diego is the eighth largest city in the United States. I'm wondering how do the current salaries stack up with those of other cities compared to major cities San Diego is as underpaid obviously smaller cities where the council members aren't full time and you know the sort of the image of a soccer mom or the dad who's an insurance salesman and he goes to a city council meeting he doesn't have a staff and he does at City Hall all day. They get paid far less but compared to larger cities according to that rule most recent city study San Diego council members made less than in Los Angeles San Francisco Oakland and San Jose. The other large cities in California. So explain to us why the salaries for the mayor and the council have stayed the same and low for so long. Well what it's blamed on is the city charter twice. Basically the city charter forces the city council to approve their own pay raises and that is a conflict of interest. And I think a lot of these council members fear political backlash. I know if I approve raise for myself my opponent of mine and my reelection campaign is going to send out a mailer with a picture of me and it says you know they voted for his own race. And I think there's a lot of fear of that. I think that's why the council members have been reluctant to increase their own pay. Why do you think they moved to put it on the ballot now. Has anything changed. I don't know. I would like to be a fly on the wall because it's somewhat surprising because it doesn't seem like anything's changed other than just time keeps pushing the salaries lower in comparison to other salaries. So it could be that the economy is improving and the numbers are just getting so extremely low compared to what you know the rest of the workforce is that I think there's a lot of worry that maybe you're not getting the quality people running for city council that you have in the past 75000 was a lot more 6 7 years ago than it is now. Now this ballot measure also closes some loopholes for elected officials. Tell us about that. Yeah it's being painted. I think the idea was to paint it as a good government reform bill and that the raises were just one element in there. I think for whatever reason it's the pay is just so striking people that that's the thing that people most in most look at. But it would eliminate a hundred dollar a month car allowance and the council members get it would prohibit them from getting paid for speeches that they that they give to organizations. It would ban them from lobbying city officials for two years after leaving office the current rule is one year it would allow outlaw city council member from doing a mailing one they're running for reelection like using their office to do a mailing that helps them even though it's supposedly a mailing to constituents about like water rates or something and then that the luxury boxes the city controls at Petco Park and then the stadium in Misch Valley which is now called San Diego County Credit Union stadium. Council members have had access to controlling those tickets free tickets and those luxury boxes and that would also go away. There's a lot of pushback on this salary raise ballot measure on social media. Some say elected officials salaries should be tied to performance. Is there any way that could actually work. I don't know of any city that has done that because I think performance of a politician is always so subjective. So I'm not sure how they could create a list of criteria. I mean I guess theoretically you could say the number of legislative pieces that you pass you get paid per legislative piece but it seems unrealistic to me. How is this salary raise ballot measure approved does it need a two thirds vote. No just 50 percent. OK. So as you said there were other ballot related actions yesterday that the council made they approved both the Soccer City and asked a yes you West ballot measures for November. There was also a transparency ballot measure approved that apparently you should have already been in place. Yeah actually voters approved the spirit of this. Yes. The 80s and early 90s quite a long time ago. And unfortunately whatever the voters approve back then it was in response that the city almost made a giant deal with it with a mobster and they only found out about it at the very last second. So basically in 1992 they basically voted that all people who were doing business with the city had to be revealed. Total transparency. Anytime the city was going to approve a contract with anyone we had this council members had to know who it was. Unfortunately the way it was written was so vague that basically if GM wanted to make a deal with the city they would have had to list every single employee who worked for GM across the nation. And so the city attorney quickly realizes that that that was unenforceable. And since then they've been kind of dragging their feet and finally now they're going to it's going to be a ballot measure that is very specific about what happens and that's going to dramatically increase transparency at City Hall. At least that's the goal. David one last question do you know why the ballot proposal to increase city leaders salaries wasn't approved unanimously. Myrtle coal has voted against it a couple of times this summer and she's never said one word. Why. I'm guessing it's because she's up for re-election and she's worried that her opponent will use that against her. But she has not said given any reason why she voted against. I've been speaking with San Diego Union Tribune reporter David Garak. David thank you. Thank you.