If you are an Arizonan who earns the minimum wage, good news! You’ll be getting a raise on Jan. 1, 2020 to $12 per hour. That works out to $24,960 per year if you work full time.
However, if you are a member of the Tucson city council, you’re not covered by the state’s minimum wage law. And unless Tucson voters are feeling generous, you’ll still be earning $24,000 per year—less than the state’s minimum wage and the same thing council members were paid two decades ago.
That’s unfair. And it is preventing a lot of well-qualified people from stepping up and seeking these critically important positions.
No business can expect to attract qualified workers unless they offer competitive salaries.
Yet we are asking members of the Tucson city council to manage what is essentially a $1.5 billion corporation with 4,500 employees—and do it for less than what minimum wage employees in this state will soon be earning.
Each one of us is part-owner of this large and important business venture that is the City of Tucson. And it is time for us to offer decent salaries to our seven most important employees: the mayor and members of the city council.
Doing so would cost each of us about only about 2 cents per month; less than a quarter annually.
Tucsonans have historically rejected salary increases for our elected officials. They have not received a raise for two decades.
By not offering salaries that are even close to competitive, we severely limit the number of people who can afford to seek these important positions.
Tucson’s city charter requires that every two years a commission be established to review the salaries of elected officials. Seven volunteers, including the five of us, were appointed by the city manager to conduct a study and report our recommendations, which are then placed on the ballot.
The bipartisan group of us recommended that the annual salary of the mayor be increased from $42,000 to $63,128; and that the annual salary of council members be increased from $24,000 to $42,081.
These numbers were selected with substantial research. The recommended increases would mean city council members would earn the median household income for the city, as measured by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban development.
The final decision will be made by voters, as Proposition 409 on the November general election ballot.
We understand those would be substantial raises. They are bigger raises then any of us received in the past year. But this is why we made this recommendation:
• The mayor and council members have not received a raise since 1999. Since then, inflation reduced their income by 51 percent, while the city population grew by 10 percent and the city budget grew by 45 percent.
• Increasing the salaries would make it possible for a larger number of people to seek the offices. With the current salary, the pool of potential candidates tilts largely to people who are independently wealthy, have a spouse with a well-paying job or are retired. A higher salary would allow more people, including those with a business background, to seek these important positions.
• Increasing the salaries would allow the mayor and council members the flexibility to be more available to their constituents, to meet the demands of their elected positions and to meet the expectations of we, their bosses.
• Tucsonans have entrusted the mayor and council with substantial responsibilities in recent years. Voters have approved $225 million in parks bonds, $100 million in street repair bonds and a half-cent sales tax increase for police and fire equipment and infrastructure improvements.
• Voters also have entrusted the mayor and council with overseeing the successful revitalization of commercial and residential development in downtown Tucson.
Tucson’s business leaders know that this is a reasonable and overdue request. The proposal has been endorsed by the Tucson Metro Chamber.
It is time to encourage more people—young people, business owners and others—to step up and serve on the city council. They can’t afford to do so at the current salary level, which doesn’t allow a wide range of qualified applicants to lead our city.
Vote “yes” on Proposition 409. It’s right for Tucson.
The authors were members of the Citizens’ Commission on Public Service and Compensation.
This article appears in Oct 24-30, 2019.
Why? What have they do to desire a raise.
Sure, as soon as Tucson is no longer one of the poorest cities in the nation.
Build roads that don’t run with water when it rains — and not that cheap chip seal crap.
Increase police response time with more officers and community service officers.
Stop getting sued for stupid stuff that you should have known about.
Stop shaking down any new business ventures for money up front.
Stop making deals with questionable real estate developers.
Bring back incentives for movies and television shows to film here.
Don’t piss off Raytheon.
Don’t piss off the U.S. Air Force.
Leverage the University of Arizona to create business opportunities and community value.
Last, but not least, work within the law, or work to change the laws, to make Tucson a safe place for everyone to include those who come here at the peril of their lives in their home countries.
except for the mayor, city council jobs were designed to be part time? Don’t disagree with the raise, but if they are in fact full time jobs, I don’t see members of the community quitting current jobs paying in the low 40’s, plus benefits, to accept a 4 yr job that they will lose if they don’t get reelected (by making appropriate decisions, fighting the right battles, and most important raise money to get reelected. Did the writers of this article not understand that?
Your article is incomplete…City council doesn’t spend money, it votes on the recommendations from the city manager, and other much higher paid staff of the city, who do the heavy lifting . Mr. Ortega, the current MGR, earns over $225,000, his executive assistant over $175,000, and numerous police, fire department, city attorneys, city staff, et al, earn over $125,00.
The last time this issue was voted on, in 2017, it was handily defeated. I would suspect it gets dusted off and reintroduced every 2 years or so.
For me, it’s not about the quality of the people who run for these posts, it’s that the tax base (yes more jobs, more development) hasn’t increased enough for the city, to attract the talent this article hints at.
Every City employee is making more than the people that are supposed to oversee them. How did that happen, was it unions? Funny that the elected are managed by the voters and the underlings increase pay for everybody else.
Being on the city council or the mayor is NOT supposed to be a full time job. They don’t need a raise, they are just showing their corruption.