07/27/10 Alexandria, Virgina — The furor we discussed last week over obscene levels of municipal pay in the tiny 38,000-person city of Bell, California — where an average resident’s salary is about $25,000 and the city manager was paid $800,000 — is hurtling toward its initial phases of resolution.
This week its council members voted to slash their own salaries from $100,000 to $8,000 per year and at least two members will not pursue re-election. The Attorney General and District Attorney are looking into criminal charges.
According to the Los Angeles Times:
“‘Since my first day as mayor, my priority has been to make Bell a city its residents can be proud to call home,’ [Mayor Oscar Hernandez] said. ‘I apologize that the council’s past decisions with regard to the indefensible administrative salaries have failed to meet that test.’ Hernandez said he will not seek another stint as mayor.
“A [Los Angeles] Times report revealed that the city’s top officials received some of the highest municipal wages in the nation. City Administrative Officer Robert Rizzo made $787,637 a year, almost twice the salary of President Obama; Police Chief Randy Adams made $457,000, 50% more than Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck; and Assistant City Manager Spaccia made $376,288, more than the top administrator for Los Angeles County.
“All three resigned last week.
“In agreeing to sweep back their salaries, Councilmen Luis Artiga and George Mirabal put themselves on par with Lorenzo Velez, who has been paid $673 a month since he was appointed to the council last summer. Velez said he was unaware his colleagues were making so much.”
Well, that’s ironic… even sharing seats on the same greed-driven board the council members didn’t mind not only earning more than ten times as much as their colleague, but also keeping him in the dark about it. The City of Bell provides an obvious and extreme example of misconduct when it comes to governmental salaries. Yet, it’s easy to imagine there are countless other instances of better-hidden salary shenanigans in municipalities throughout the nation… it’s a system ripe for abuse.
You can read more details in Los Angeles Times coverage of how Bell council members are cutting their own salaries by 90 percent.
Best,
Rocky Vega,
The Daily Reckoning
Rocky Vega
Rocky Vega is publisher of Agora Financial International, where he advances the growth of Agora Financial publishing enterprises outside of the US. Previously, he was publisher of The Daily Reckoning, and founding publisher of both UrbanTurf and RFID Update -- which he ran from Brazil, Chile, and Puerto Rico -- as well as associate publisher of FierceFinance. Rocky has an honors MS from the Stockholm School of Economics and an honors BA from Harvard University, where he served on the board of directors for Let’s Go Publications, Harvard Student Agencies, and The Harvard Advocate.
The Daily Reckoning is your premier source for making sense of the news Washington and Wall Street generate. Each business day, The Daily Reckoning calls on its stable of world-class writers and thinkers to show you how to get ahead.
Start your 100% FREE subscription to The Daily Reckoning today and you’ll get a free research report, “How to Survive the Fall of Social Security.” Simply enter your email address below to get your free report and join over 495,000 worldwide Daily Reckoning subscribers!
We Respect Your Privacy and We will
Never Share or Sell Your Email Address
I don’t get it? What did they do; something wrong? They were just being like all the other political scum-bags. I would have thought they would have said they did not get paid an exorbitant amount and go on with their business.
California Municipal workers pay,vacation and retirement benefits are obscene.
The people out here need to vote out these
tax sucking leaches all around the state.
In reality there are 100s of municipalties out here with way overpaid workers.Where are the workers?Well you see them in their new RVs heading for the Colorado River or Palm Desert for the weekend towing Jet Skis.LOL
This has been going on and on (the abuse). If there is a collusion in favoritism for job security, for pay, benefits, bonus, perks, bonuses, raises, or severance packages that seems abnormal, the department should look not for the typical but industry wide norm before approving such payment. In case of abuse of such payments the person showing favoritism for excessive payments and the person accepting abnormal gratuity should both face resignation as a possible outcome. Also there should be external audit reports giving opinion on financial payments.
This is criminal larceny without the violence, and must be prosecuted as such. They are simple thieves. No more, no less.
Maybe they should move to Louisiana , they would fit right in with our crocked officials the pay seems correct.
And you wonder why the nation is in the shape it is in. The public sector and public unions are out of control, how many private sector jobs pay 50k to 80k a yr retirement? My wifes sister will get 90 k a yr , retiring at age 50 as a purchasing agent at a big university. Another lady that was a second grade teacher gets over 80k a yr. And yet another , a teacher I had in high school told me he had got back everything he put into retirement in 8 yrs. And exclaimed , I don’t see how this is sustainable.
Bc, I don’t think these are “union” people. They are elected officials. And I don’t know where these teachers you are talking about are from, because the teachers I know don’t get anywhere close to that.
When will the Big One hit? Can’t be soon enough.
Eliminate 50% of all ,ALL,ALL,Governmental jobs, including custodial,administrative,consultants and all education fat, etc !!!!
There is a pernicious and corrupt law in many state and local governments. It is also the law in the federal government as well: Pay increases for elected officials and others are automatic unless a majority of the governing body (city council, state and federal legislature etc.) votes against it.
Used to be that all pay increases for elected officials had to be voted up or down in open session. This put a damper on frequent increases because the voting public would throw the bums out if they began to get too greedy. That restraint has been removed and these obscene wages are the result. Notice that not even the Tea Party’s choices, that were elected in the last midterm election, have moved to overthrow this law. Would you if you were them?
I think what all people fail to realize is the fact whether they believe it or not what goes on in the dark will come to light shining very bright and, people and situations will eventually reveal themselves.
A woman ran for mayor of a nearby county. It was estimated that her election campain cost were close to a million dollars. This was for a job that paid under $80,000 a year.
Until recently [last year]only federal politicians had to submit who their campain donors were and how much they recieved. It must be through graft that the politicians were making up the difference.
Maybe I would get the heck out of california, you can’go west so maybe you go east so you want fall into the water. you think so.
life in jail , loss of pension and every cent they have should be the punishement for any corrupt political person. Let’s see how many want the job then
But wait…my understanding is that these government “servants” – as I’ve heard implied thousands of times by those in government – are smarter than the average citizen. They will tell you that all of that salary and excessive benefits and astounding pensions are deserved because their jobs are the most difficult on the face of the earth. They’re jobs that the average citizen just cannot do, or even fathom doing.
We should all be thankful for these government workers sacrificing the opportunities for much better pay elsewhere too work for the little people.
This argument has worked extremely well for decades…perhaps not much longer.
In response to LMM who said
“Bc, I don’t think these are “union” people. They are elected officials. And I don’t know where these teachers you are talking about are from, because the teachers I know don’t get anywhere close to that.”
If you’d like to see teacher salaries from the state of ohio, just go to this link:
http://www.buckeyeinstitute.org/teacher-salary
In our district (Sylvania, a middle class suburb of Toledo), teacher salaries of 80,000+ are common.