I have a different take on the City Council’s pay raise idea, versus the letter to the editor last week.
To start with, perhaps councilmen King and Imker need to read the fine print more closely, as to exactly what an elected position pays, before they choose to run for said position.
You both stress that you don’t need the money, and the current pay is hardly worth your time. Who forced you to run?
Secondly, I have no opposition to increasing the pay. The amount sounds reasonable. But it’s all in the way it’s done. If you vote yourselves a raise, do the ethical thing: make the raise effective after the next time you face the voters.
This, I believe, is how it works for the U.S. Congress and the president.
Lastly, when the council gave city employees the day off with pay on Monday, Dec. 23, a council member said that “we” gave them the day off for a job well-done in 2013. Councilman King said, effectively, that “nothing would get done on that day anyway.”
So you’re admitting that they’re going to loaf their way through the day. But they’re such great employees that they deserve a paid day without work, and year-end bonuses?
And to clarify: YOU didn’t give them the day off. If you had, the council members would have paid the city worker’s salary from your own pockets. The taxpayers paid for that day off. Don’t forget that.
Frank Herman
Peachtree City, Ga.
