The city council voted to let the residents decide whether or not the members deserve a pay raise.
The council has not has a salary increase since 1996 and could have doubled the monthly salary to $870 a month from $435 at Tuesday’s meeting. Instead, the vote was 4-1 to place an initiative on a 2018 ballot asking the voters’ opinion. Bill Sandke voted no.
The Coronado City Council is the second lowest paid in the county. Only Del Mar, which pays its councilmembers $300 per month, ranks lower.
The staff had recommended approving a lump sum raise and then placing a measure on the ballot to index future pay raises, so they would occur automatically.
Mayor Casey Tanaka argued that it wasn’t up to council members to decide what they were worth, it was up to the voters.
“I think for a raise to be meaningful it has to come from our boss, the public,” he said. Two members of the public at the meeting, Brad Gerbel and Morgan Miller, stepped forward to give their full, unqualified support.
“To pay our city council this little is wrong,” Gerbel, a CPA and Bailey’s campaign manager said. “You are grossly underpaid for what the city expects of you.” Bicycle Advisory Commissioner Miller told the council, “You guys do a fantastic job. A large, very large, raise is due.”
“We do a lot of work up here,” Sandke concurred, noting that he, Carrie Downey, and Richard Bailey were self-employed. Mike Woiwode is retired. Tanaka is a teacher. For those self-employed council members, time spent on council business directly cuts into their income.
Downey said that during her first year on the council she tracked her time the way she tracks her time based on her billable hours as an attorney. At the end of that year she calculated that she was earning 60 cents an hour.
The below-minimum wages did not deter Downey. She has served the city for a decade. Eight of those years on the city council. “None of us do this for money,” Mayor-elect Richard Bailey said. “It’s an honor and a privilege to serve.”
Tanaka pointed to what might be called Coronado “exceptionalism.” Other cities pay their elected officials more, just as they charge more to park in their business districts. “We charge 25 cents an hour for our meters. San Diego charges $1.25. That’s Coronado, that’s who we are.”
After listening to Tanaka’s argument, Bailey signaled his support by expressing his confidence in the voters’ wisdom. “The majority of citizens see how involved we are,” Bailey said.
Going to the voters is not without risk. To avoid public suspicion the Del Mar City Council put its pay raise to a vote. That was in 1988. It hasn’t had a pay raise since. Once the measure goes on the ballot the council will no longer be able to raise its own salary, City Attorney Johanna Canlas pointed out. “Once you go to the public, you have to keep going back to them.”
Fourth and Alameda Traffic Signal
The council rejected Downey’s request to discuss the proposed traffic light at Fourth and Alameda at a future meeting. The vote was 3-2 with Tanaka and Downey supporting the request.
Some 50 residents who live near the intersection signed a petition citing safety concerns. If valid, Downey wanted the safety issues mitigated before the project went forward.
There was little appetite on the council to discuss the residents’ concerns separately. Some suggested it was a ploy to derail the project.
“We did something. We didn’t fiddle while Rome burned. Now somebody has brought out the fiddle,” Sandke said. “We already have something Caltrans has approved. Lets go forward not backward.”
According to City Manager Blair King, the project is well underway. Caltrans, which has jurisdiction, is expected to issue an encroachment permit and the city is readying plans to add decorative street lamps to the street and tie it to the Gateway Project, King told the council. He also said that on its own initiative, members of his staff would meet with residents before the council holds its final vote and the project goes out to bid.
Avenue of Heroes
The council endorsed plan to install tall, decorative street lamps on Fourth Street (aka Avenue of Heroes) by amending the TransNet Local Street Improvement Program to allow the city take $550 thousand from the Bridge Toll Funds. General fund revenues will also be used to augment the costs, King said.
Besides the lighting, the project will also include landscaping, traffic calming features and a more decorative signal at Fourth and Alameda, said Ed Walton city engineer.
The plans have been endorsed by the Avenue of Heroes Neighborhood Association. It will “create an environment befitting the heroes project,” said Barbara Tate, the association’s president.
Other Council Actions
- Agreed to revise a city ordinance to allow skateboarding and roller skating on city streets.
- Reappointed Akshay Sateesh to the Parks and Recreation Commission and Carlene Glass to the Transportation Commission.
- Approved a Historic Alteration Permit, setbacks and zoning exceptions for a Mills Act house at 855 Alameda.
- Approved condo conversions on the 400 block of E Avenue and the 200 block of B Avenue.
