Increase to Council Wages

Many people are upset at the recent raise council members voted for themselves. This should have been done a year ago as per section 3.02 of Policy No. 8043 City Council Remuneration which says

“Remuneration shall be reviewed in the third year of each Council term and compared against average annual base salary paid to City Council members in the Comparator (Peer) Group and considering the unique governance responsibilities of the City of Medicine Hat.”

Because this was addressed so late in the term, we had people vote on it who had already filed their nomination papers - if that is not pecuniary interest, I don't know what is.

If they vote for the raise, they risk losing votes; if they vote against, they risk being accused of pandering for votes.

The City of Calgary takes a different approach - council members do NOT vote on their own paycheque, they have a Council Compensation Review Committee - no council member sits on it. It is made up entirely of 5 members of the public who have expertise in this area. They do not use the Comparator (Peer) Group, they use the Alberta Average Weekly Earnings. Excerpt from the 2024 report about the 2021 wages found on this page -

Although this Committee’s mandate covers the period after the next election of Council in late 2021 onwards, we note that unprecedented circumstances stemming from COVID-19 have skewed the Alberta Average Weekly Earnings (“AWE”) calculation normally used to determine Council pay adjustments. We therefore recommend no salary adjustment, up or down, for Calgary members of Council in 2021.

Maintaining the current Alberta Average Weekly Earnings (“AWE”) calculation methodology as the basis for determining Council’s annual pay adjustments, using data from the September-to-September period. Since the AWE reflects the economic conditions experienced by Albertans, it is appropriate for compensation for Members of Council to be aligned with the same economic realities as their constituents. The CCRC is not recommending any changes to base pay for Members of Council.

I don’t know if a committee is necessary for our city but we could certainly do something different than having council members vote on their own paycheques. The clause that council members can refuse a raise should be eliminated too; it pits those who can afford to refuse the raise against those who cannot. If the council member wants to return the money they can do so or donate it to a charity.

Here is a graph as to the Comparator Cities, how much each council member gets paid and how many residents per council member. The information came from this document published by the City of Medicine Hat.

The “Residents per Member" does not include the mayor - the mayor holds a different role.

People have been talking about wards - the average size of the wards in Calgary and Edmonton is well over the size of Medicine Hat.

I favour having full time council members. The MGA recommends 7 including the mayor for a city of our size but as long as the number is more than 3 and is an odd number, the city can pass a bylaw citing the number. I'm good with 5. If the work is too much for 5, then we can always add more.

Right now many council members have full time jobs. Some have young families at home and trying to shoehorn in council duties with other obligations is just setting them up to fail. Councillor Darren Hirsch recently cited the increased demands of his day job to be incompatible with running for re-election.

One person has said to me that they would rather keep the same numbers as they want more diversity on council. However, we do not appoint people to council, they are elected. I don't know the answer to having a more diverse council; I’m open to suggestions.

We have been too stagnant for too long; we have outgrown part-time council members. It's time we grew up as a city and got down to business. No more part-timers, our city DESERVES full time council members.