Mayor Nutter will give back his 5.13 percent increase, as will 19 cabinet members and commissioners who are scheduled for the increase, a spokesman said yesterday.
Nutter slashed his $186,044 salary 10 percent in November in announcing budget cuts to deal with the worsening financial crisis. The COLA amount is $9,544, for a total giveback of about $28,000. Nutter is also taking a 2 percent cut in the form of a one-week furlough this year - five unpaid vacation days that he'll most likely work through.
Council Majority Whip Darrell Clarke said he was waiting for a chance next week to meet with Council President Anna C. Verna, who has been out since her husband, Severino, died June 13.
The Nutter administration has asked the four unions representing the city's more than 20,000 blue- and white-collar workers, whose contracts expire Tuesday, to accept four-year contracts with no raises. In that light, Clarke said, it may be difficult for Council members to accept an increase in their $112,233 salaries.
"If the municipal workers don't get a raise, we'd have to consider doing something different," he said.
Councilwoman Maria Quiñones Sánchez said she could not see Council taking a raise of any kind "given the economic times."
"I'm clear that it would be inappropriate for City Council, at this time, to take the increase," she said.
How that would work is unclear. Council established the automatic annual raise in 2003, when it overrode a veto by Mayor John F. Street and upped Council salaries from $85,339 to $98,000.
The COLA is based on the current Consumer Price Index, which came in at 5.13 percent this year, Finance Director Rob Dubow said. Last year it was 1.57 percent.
That 2003 ordinance also raised all other elected officials salaries, including the mayor's, which rose from $144,009 to $165,000.
Most important, Clarke said, is that whatever Council's 17 members decide, they act as one. He said he did not like it this year when eight members gave back 5 percent of their salary - Clarke was not one of them - and the others were criticized in the press.
"We're going to have a conversation, because whatever we do, we should all do the same," Clarke said.
What more do you need to talk about? Eight members gave their increase back, so the nine who did not need yet need to do the same. Less talk, more walk.— CleanupPhilly- No, they do not need to all act as one. Just because 9 may be pigs (and feel politically safe) the other 8 shouldn't get a free ride. If they take the COLA increase, they should be condemned, no ifs, ands or buts.— willll
- As long as City Council is taking pay raises, even just one of them, keeping DROP, driving free cars, and not making any cuts, collections, or fixing assessments with something like AVI, I recommend people oppose the hike in the state personal income tax. Tell them that Philly's City Council hasn't done enough to control costs and waste, fixed collections, or updated assessments to be legal and fair, so there really is no need to raise taxes first. Sign the petition: http://www.stoppataxhike.com/— CleanupPhilly
- I don't even get a chance to give mine back, I have never gotten one. It has been ten years since I left the government. But, I understand, senior citizens are a waste of their time. Except on election day.— FJG JR
- On the eve of our Independence Day I cannot believe that our elected leaders(?) have chosen not to lead but to exacerbate the problems systemic to our city. The tax increases looming, the disastrous service cuts, the ridiculous non-solutions to the BRT property tax and the whimsical application of a ethereal tax code that exists in the minds of these workers while they spend their days on the street - ASSESSING - assessing what? The latest sales at the suburban malls? A police commissioner who cannot respond effectively to crime and a mayor who thinks he is still a councilperson and not displaying the kind of leadership the get in Pittsburgh from a 20 something mayor. Our 4th of July celebrations have been systematically eliminated from the neighborhoods because of "costs" yet we managed to have parades for the city teams. There is no explanation for the gross disparity between what city hall finds expense-worthy and the neglect to our neighborhoods and even moreso to our children while they live in this concrete prison with no chance for parole, for entertainment, for a future or even a glimmer of hope. I hope we are proud of what we have done to our children and their limited options while they sweat and pray they are not shot or robbed or mugged or just bullied by our elected leaders. Please don't go gently into that good night. Move out of the city while you can still sell your house.— Chaz0611
MONEY AND JUSTICE DON'T MIX
WILL THE NEW COUNCIL GIVE YOU A SAY?
Tips? Comments? Questions?
Contact:
Doron Taussig:
215-854-5307
doron.taussig@gmail.com
@dorontaussig
Holly Otterbein:
215-854-5809
hm.otterbein@gmail.com
@hollyotterbein
Juliana Reyes:
215-854-5855
juliana.f.reyes@gmail.com
@juliana_f_reyes
 | Follow on Twitter |
- Philly Clout
- Metropolis
- Attytood
- Heard in the Hall
- Commonwealth Confidential
- Philebrity
- Phawker
- Young Philly Politics
- OurPhiladelphia
- Capitol Ideas
- Grassroots PA
- PA Policy Blog
- Media Mobilizing Project
- The Notebook
- Dave Davies Off Mic
- Committee of Seventy
- The Independent
- Naked City
- Plan Philly
- February
- January
- December 2011
- November 2011
- October 2011
- September 2011
- August 2011
- July 2011
- June 2011
- May 2011
- April 2011
- March 2011
- February 2011
- January 2011
- December 2010
- November 2010
- October 2010
- September 2010
- August 2010
- July 2010
- June 2010
- May 2010
- April 2010
- March 2010
- February 2010
- January 2010
- December 2009
- November 2009
- October 2009
- September 2009
- August 2009
- July 2009
- June 2009
- May 2009
- April 2009
- March 2009
- February 2009
- January 2009
- December 2008
- November 2008
- October 2008
- September 2008
- News | Sports | Business | What's Happening | Restaurants & Food | Entertainment | Living | Marketplace | Jobs
