The Lewis County Citizen Salary Commission voted on Tuesday not to adjust salaries for the Board of County Commissioners (BOCC) and to table further discussion of the officials’ pay until March 2023.
The citizen commission could, theoretically, call a special meeting between now and next March if enough members of the committee were interested, but as it stands now, pay for the top seats in county government will likely remain unaltered this year.
Last March, the salary commission implemented guidelines for setting the BOCC salaries based on the per-capita income change of Lewis County residents.
As commission member Eric Carlson phrased it during that meeting, the idea behind this was to increase elected officials salaries at the same rate the average Lewis County taxpayer saw their own salary go up.
“If we're going to experience pain then so should our elected officials,” Carlson said in March.
Salary commission Chairman Bob Berg said that number would have given the commissioners close to a 10% salary increase, which is about how much the average citizen’s salary had gone up since the last adjustment to BOCC salaries was made in 2020.
However, during Tuesday’s meeting, after a long discussion, four of the seven members present voted not to adopt the raise at all, instead voting to maintain the commissioners’ salaries as they currently stand. Three members present gave dissenting votes, signaling that the original metric chosen by the salary commission to determine the BOCC’s raises should be adopted. But, the ayes had it, and the commissioners will likely not get a raise this year because of it.
Including both salary and benefits, the Lewis County commissioners each make more than $100,000 per year, according to previous reporting by The Chronicle.
Last August, the BOCC rescinded the salary commission’s review of pay for the auditor, assessor, clerk, coroner, prosecuting attorney and treasurer, making the salary commission question whether they have authority to set those salaries at all or if their work is simply a “recommendation.” After months of researching the topic, it was determined that was the case — the salary commission’s position on electeds salaries outside of the BOCC is simply advisory.
Berg said perhaps “resentment” was too strong a word, but his understanding from the meeting discussion was that salary commission members were still upset over the BOCC not adopting the original recommendations.
“There were some strongly-held beliefs by members of the commission that they shouldn't have done that, that they'd given us a mission when we were appointed,” Berg said.
Two months after originally voting against the recommendation, the BOCC turned around and implemented the recommendation for the other electeds, which gave them a 10% raise, Berg said. Shortly after, they tied the salaries of those officials to a percentage of the superior court judge salary, which gave the officials another 8% raise.
“To some members of the salary commission, it's like they got an 18% raise. … It appears that other members of the commission were not happy that they got this double wage adjustment,” Berg said. “Yet, others felt that had nothing to do with where we are now, (that) we have a mission and the mission has not changed relative to our work vis-a-vis county commissioner salaries.”
Berg said he was surprised the discussion and consequent vote took place, given that the committee had already voted on the method they would use to set the salaries, but ultimately, the commission was within its rights as the only group with authority to change BOCC pay.
The next salary commission meeting is scheduled for March 9, 2023 at 5:30 p.m. in the Lewis County Courthouse Commissioners Hearing Room.
