From a Dan Halloran Op-Ed in the Gotham Gazette:
We want and expect our City Council members to be the best and brightest our city has to offer, but it is becoming harder and harder to expect top-of-the-line professionals to choose public service. A recent Gotham Gazette article reported that many City Council members earn outside income, with some making substantial amounts. This suggests that New York City's council members should be full-time city employees. Such a change would go a long way to truly reforming our city government.
Currently, council members make $112,000 per year (I'm one of a handful of council members who doesn't receive a "lulu" for chairing a committee); our city's absurd tax burden just about cuts that in half. I own my home in my district, and that is an expensive undertaking even by New York City standards. By no means am I asking for sympathy, I feel that I’m a lucky one -- I live comfortably, and I'm very thankful for that.
Millions of New Yorkers no doubt pay their bills while earning less than their council member makes. Even though council members do have to disclose their incomes, the salary ranges they report have enormous variation -- sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars. You could throw a dart at a board with random salaries on it and make a better guess at what your council member earns moonlighting.
Rather than have all this vague disclosure, the city should mandate that council members put in 40-hour weeks to enable them to provide true, full-time constituent services. Along with that, the city should increase the pay for the position. We should have to fill out time sheets just as our subordinates do and account for our time. Of course, some of the members already devote far in excess of a 40-hour week to their districts and the city, and for that, I am grateful.
The Daily News thinks it's time to clean up the council.
17 comments:
Good idea Dan!
Having part time council members shortchanges us.
Most workers get paid for an eight hour shift.
Why should C.M.s be any different?
With too much extra time on their hands they might become covert lobbyists.
Or in the case of some arrogant pols like "Moby" Stavisky and "granny" Shulman completely out in the open.
Put it in a public referendum and I'll vote for that.
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Watch my new YouTube and I want to ask you this.
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I think not unless you want Mike for a forth term.
Remember city council voted themselves a raise at the time the NYPD's starting salary was lowered.
It should be a full-time job, but $112 is a lot cash. Now the assembly and senate, that's a joke. Give them and the judges a raise and take away all their outside employment (and the conflicts of interest that go along with that).
oh yeah, 112 thousand isn't enough...
The councilperson should make the median salary of their district. The high salary doesn't yield the best and the brightest, it yields the most money hungry. There needs to be a big change. We need people who will do the job for less than half that amount.
And work harder. Hell, I do half their work for free! It's about being motivated to improve life in this city, not about money.
A couple of years ago they voted themselves a 25% raise, with the pledge that they will work full-time. Now, we learn that it's still not fulltime, and they want another raise.
GREAT IDEA, WASN'T THAT WHAT ALFREDO CENTOLA HAS BEEN SAYING ALL ALONG? CHECK OUT HIS FACEBOOK POSTS AS FAR BACK AS JUNE 20TH OF THIS YEAR AND A COUPLE FROM LAST YEAR I BELIEVE. YOU CAN FIND IT ON DANS PAGE, OR I AM SURE IF YOU EMAIL VIA FACE BOOK, HE WILL FOWARD YOU THE LINK. NICE TO SEE DAN LISTENS TO THE VOTERS. GOOD GOING DAN, NICE TO SEE YOU CARE.
GREAT IDEA, WASN'T THAT WHAT ALFREDO CENTOLA HAS BEEN SAYING ALL ALONG? CHECK OUT HIS FACEBOOK POSTS AS FAR BACK AS JUNE 20TH OF THIS YEAR AND A COUPLE FROM LAST YEAR I BELIEVE. YOU CAN FIND IT ON DANS PAGE, OR I AM SURE IF YOU EMAIL VIA FACE BOOK, HE WILL FOWARD YOU THE LINK. NICE TO SEE DAN LISTENS TO THE VOTERS. GOOD GOING DAN, NICE TO SEE YOU CARE.
Thanks Anonymous, my only other caveat is that if they are attorneys, they shelve their law license while in office and once out they cannot represent or work for any organization that has city contracts for the first two years.
Thanks for Listening Mr. Halloran
Thanks Anonymous, my only other caveat is that if they are attorneys, they shelve their law license while in office and once out they cannot represent or work for any organization that has city contracts for the first two years.
wow! you mean like all the other attorneys in the executive branch? don't you know that legislators always exempt themselves?
It doesn't look like Halloran is asking for a raise. He's saying that it ought to be that way for future Councilors, not the current ones.
I think his main concern though is eliminating conflicts of interests with members that have outside incomes. Which seems pretty fair to me. If making it full time and increasing the salary a little makes that happen it's a good investment.
thanks for lobbying the d.o.e. to open the newly renovated P.S.159 playground to park conversion.
their closing of it 24/7 was a waste for the taxpayer's teens in this
area of Bayside. toddlers section is still locked? why?
the teens are really utilizing the basketball courts,even though there are no full courts for them. i guess our community kids will never share in the big money in the N.B.A.? the N.B.A. does not have a half/court league
wow! you mean like all the other attorneys in the executive branch? don't you know that legislators always exempt themselves?
Exempt themselves?
Councilmembers don't, they still maintain an office and they are not limited once out of office.
I just wish my first and last name wasn't mentioned,, Didn't want to take away from Halloran getting it done.
The councilperson should make the median salary of their district.
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That's Brillant! I live in Dan's district and doubt most people make anywhere near 112K here.
I sure don't!
#2, you have not been reading the right newspapers.
it has recently been reported that federal,state and city employees earn twice the income(if you include pension benefits) than private sector employees,on average.
the legislators vote their own raises in, regardless if the nation's unemployment rates are 9.5% to 17 % . municipal unions could care less if the private sector is broke." bleed them more,the rich bastards",they say.
obama says:here is some more stimulus(taxpayer dollars) and the democrat congress will give you some more this week.like $26 BILLION TO THE 180 DAY/YEAR WORKING TEACHERS UNIONS IN THE U.S.
the chickens will be coming home to roost soon.....
"We want and expect our City Council members to be the best and brightest our city has to offer, but it is becoming harder and harder to expect top-of-the-line professionals to choose public service."
Dan - I happen to like you - but, this statement above is somewhat elitist.
The best and the brightest most often are NOT in politics or law for that matter - they also do NOT enter a profession based solely on love of money.
I assume the reason why City Council members work part time is because they are SUPPOSED to earn outside income thereby taking the burden off of taxpayers. Earning an unlimited amount of outside income also is SUPPOSED deter corruption -
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