Authorities watchdogs Residents Union and Frequent Trigger say they oppose the New York Metropolis Council’s plan to lift salaries of its members and different prime metropolis officers, not due to the proposed will increase themselves — however due to the way in which the council desires to enact them.
Underneath the proposal, metropolis council members, the mayor, the general public advocate, borough presidents and comptroller would get 16% raises, and district attorneys would see a 6% wage improve.
Introduction 1493 would have council members give themselves their first elevate since 2016, from $148,500 to $172,500. The council based mostly that determine on value of dwelling, elevated job expectations and will increase to non-public, nonprofit and different electeds’ salaries in comparable cities, like Chicago.
Grace Rauh, government director of the group Residents Union, raised issues that the council making its personal suggestion with out impartial enter might deteriorate public belief in authorities at a Tuesday Committee on Authorities Operations listening to on the invoice.
In line with Rauh, the plan additionally goes in opposition to the town constitution, which requires the mayor to convene an impartial fee to review and make suggestions for adjustments in elected officers’ salaries each 4 years — one thing Mayors Invoice de Blasio and Eric Adams each uncared for to do.
“For more than 50 years, every increase in the salaries of elected officials in New York City has followed the work of an independent compensation commission, which has conducted reviews and issued recommendations on pay,” Rauh stated. “The current proposal before the city council breaks from that precedent, offers no supporting analysis for the proposed 16% increase and is being advanced in an 11th-hour manner to work around the very clear prohibition in the city charter that bars the council from raising pay during a lame duck period like the one that we are in.”
“The approach that you all are considering undermines public trust and creates a troubling precedent,” she added.
The town constitution prohibits the council from passing payments to extend their salaries throughout the lame duck interval between Election Day and Jan. 1, the beginning of a brand new time period. Although the council is barely making ready the invoice now and plans to vote within the new yr, Rauh stated she believed it was disingenuous to the constitution’s intent, and even doubtlessly legally dicey, to carry hearings on the invoice within the lame duck interval to set it up for a fast vote as quickly as Jan. 1 passes.
“We think that if the city council goes forward with this legislation…in January, that there could be legal challenges to the pay raise because of the timing,” Rauh stated. “By holding the hearing today and introducing the bill and again in January as a pre-considered bill, they may actually be opening themselves up to potential legal challenges.”
“Regardless, the lame duck period in particular reeks of self-dealing,” Rauh added. “There’s something that feels particularly fraught about immediately winning reelection and then working on a pay raise [during] the one period of time where you can’t actually vote through a pay raise.”
New York Regulation Faculty professor Stephen Louis stated the council making ready and holding hearings on the invoice didn’t break the regulation, as a result of so long as the invoice is reintroduced and voted on within the new yr outdoors of the restrictive lame duck interval, it wouldn’t go in opposition to the constitution.
He stated one might name the invoice “inappropriate,” however given the mayor not appointing the fee as required, it didn’t “seem that outrageous,” and wouldn’t be inconsistent with the constitution.
Rauh and Samantha Sanchez, coverage supervisor on the group Frequent Trigger, emphasised throughout Tuesday’s listening to that they believed the general public officers deserved a elevate, and may search one by means of different legislative means..
Rauh advised the council cross a invoice requiring Mayor-Elect Zohran Mamdani to arrange an impartial fee to contemplate wage will increase inside his first month in workplace; cross a invoice permitting the council to ascertain an impartial fee of its personal to make wage suggestions; or amend the regulation to make sure one other elected official establishes an impartial compensation fee if the mayor fails to, stopping a lapse in wage overview and improve sooner or later.
She stated the council might additionally contemplate looking for a court docket order compelling the mayor to nominate an impartial compensation fee.
“The council has sued mayoral administrations in the past for failing to carry out local laws,” Rauh stated. “That option has been available for several years and remains available today. None of these options require abandoning half a century of precedent of rushing through flawed legislation.”
However, this stuff take time, one thing the invoice’s sponsor, Council Member Natasha Williams, and cosponsor, Council Member Lincoln Restler, stated they felt was of the essence. Each stated they wished the council to vote on wage will increase as quickly as attainable due to the near-decade members have labored with no elevate and to make sure “the best and brightest,” not simply the wealthiest, proceed to be drawn to public service.
Moreover, as a result of metropolis council members are term-limited, if the mayor established a committee to create a wage improve suggestion, members raised issues that the time it might take for a suggestion to be supplied, voted on and enacted may lead to extra council members not as soon as getting a elevate whereas in workplace.
Council Member Nantasha Williams, who launched the wage improve invoice, listens to public testimony. Offered by New York Metropolis Council
When requested about whether or not the teams’ testimony and strategies impacted her place on her invoice, Williams informed amNew York Regulation she “appreciated” the testimony and supposed to work with the incoming speaker and her colleagues on “a plan that works best” to extend salaries.
“I look forward to working with the incoming speaker to craft a plan that supports a cost-of-living adjustment,” Williams stated.
If the invoice passes subsequent yr, the mayor’s wage would improve from $258,750 to $300,500; the general public advocate’s wage from $184,800 to $215,000; all 5 borough presidents’ from $179,200 to $208,000; the comptroller’s from $209,050 to $243,000; the town council speaker’s from $164,500 to $191,000; and all 5 district attorneys from $232,600 to $247,500.
The invoice would additionally require the mayor to convene an advisory fee to overview and make suggestions relating to the compensation ranges of elected officers earlier than the tip of subsequent yr, which Williams stated demonstrated the council’s intent and need for an impartial fee to make wage suggestions going ahead after this.
The invoice will doubtless be one of many first that comes throughout Mamdani’s desk within the new yr. His press secretary didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon whether or not he would assist the invoice.
