De Blasio Agrees To Raises For City Council Members In Exchange For Reforms
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) -- Mayor Bill de Blasio has accepted recommendations by a panel that city elected officials should get raises in exchange for a ban on outside jobs.
De Blasio sent a letter to City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito on Wednesday formally accepting the recommendations of the independent Quadrennial Commission.
The three-person panel recommended a 23 percent, or $25,815, raise for City Council members, which would raise their pay from $112,500 to $138,315 a year.
The commission also recommended banning most outside employment for Council members in order to prevent conflicts of interest.
De Blasio's salary would rise by 15 percent, or more than $33,000, from $225,000 to $258,750 under the recommendations. But de Blasio has said he will not accept a raise this term.
Mark-Viverito's salary would rise 37 percent.
As CBS2's Dick Brennan reported, city lawmakers have not had a raise in more than a decade. But some New Yorkers did not like the idea.
"What are they doing for us?" said East Side resident Linda Montalvo. "Absolutely nothing – and we're the taxpayers that have to foot the bill for everything else. I think it's very unfair."
"Elected officials, you know, they shouldn't really be in it for the money. They should be in it for the service. So I think if anything, the civil service commission people who work below them should be getting paid more – not them," said student John Vasquez.
"If you're an official; you're running an election, you're probably from an upper-middle class to an upper class, and the money – the raise should be saved for the people in the middle and lower class," said student Trushal Paldhi. "I don't think they deserve to have that raise."
At least one police union is furious over the big boost. Patrolmen's Benevolent Association President President Patrick Lynch said in a statement the raise is "an abomination and an insult to every police officer in this city who is expected to make do with two 1 percent raises…. How dare they accept these unconscionable increases while underpaying the very men and women who put their lives on the line to protect them?"
The New York district attorneys and borough presidents would also get a raise.
The Council must now vote on the raises.
(TM and © Copyright 2016 CBS Radio Inc. and its relevant subsidiaries. CBS RADIO and EYE Logo TM and Copyright 2016 CBS Broadcasting Inc. Used under license. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
