City Hall - London Ont. (Angelique Guerard/XFM News)
The debate regarding full time pay for council members was once more brought up during a recent meeting.
Ward 1 Coun. Michael Van Holst wrote to fellow councilors on Jan. 9th to appeal to council regarding a motion.
The letter read:
“I was pleased that Council supported a move to daytime City Council meetings. It moves us toward a council that works similar daytime hours as our staff. In some reports comparing
municipalities, that is called a full-time council.
Ultimately, that is what I believe would best serve London. To continue the dialogue (or rule out the idea altogether), we need to know the remuneration for a full-time councillor. To this end, I ask that you support the following motion:
That the compensation taskforce BE REQUESTED to also determine an appropriate stipend for a councillor that keeps typical daytime office hours.”
Councilors are not paid by the hour, due to irregular working hours. Pay also varies by municipality. For example, compensation for councilors in London is $52,725, while in Windsor, it’s $46,321.
Ward 11 Coun. Stephen Turner says that while the question of whether councilors should be compensated more is a fair one, asking it this way is “a little out of step.”
“We need to get our act together and just sit down and decide what’s it going to be instead of perpetually doing these these little things that that really stoke division within the council and the community.”
Ward 2 Coun. Shawn Lewis agreed with Turner, stating that it’s past time council stopped tiptoeing around the pay question.
“It’s not unreasonable to be to expect that they’re compensated for the time they put in. It is public service, but it is not free service. It’s not volunteer service. It’s, it’s a burden. That’s an incredible privilege. You have a lot of important weighty decisions to make,” said Lewis.
Ward 4 Coun. Helmer reminded the council that the last compensation task force recommended tying councilor pay to the full-time median income in London.
“I don’t really know where the idea that this is not full time compensation for a full time job is coming from half the people in our community who work full time make less than what we make. And half the people who work full time in our community make more. ”
He went on to add that he felt that council members who wanted more pay wanted to be in the 75th percentile, as opposed to the median pay.
“It was set at the full time median income. I think that’s pretty clear that it’s pegged at a level that’s a full time salary for a lot of people.”
Finally, the last person to comment was Ward 5 Coun. Maureen Cassidy. She commented that it’s difficult to define what the council members do as “full-time” and should be seen rather as someone’s “primary focus.”
“This idea is of the full time versus part time is kind of a red herring, we put the effort in that we are that we each feel we need to put in…I think the idea of a more equitable share of the workload on council is something is a discussion that is worthy to have.”
She added that multiple members sit on multiple boards and commissions, some being a lot of work.
City Council voted 12 – 3 to take no action regarding the push. Coun. Hamou, Coun. Lewis, and Coun. Van Holst opposed, while all others were in favour.
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