The Chula Vista City Council Tuesday night approved an increase in salary for themselves, the mayor and city attorney.
The 2.4 percent raise is retroactive to July 1 and follows an increase they received in 2014.
In 2000 voters passed Prop. A, which stated salary increases for the council and city attorney are based on the increases appropriated to superior court judges.
Under the city charter, the mayor receives 66 percent of that salary when there is a raise and council members get 40 percent of what the mayor earns.
The city attorney will make the same amount as a superior court judge.
With the increase the mayor’s annual base salary goes up to $124,767 from $121,842.
Council members will see a salary bump from $48,737 to $49,907 annually.
City Attorney Glenn Googins will earn the same amount as a superior court judge and will have his salary go from $184,610 to $189,041 per year.
The council voted 3-1 in favor of the raise, with Councilwoman Pat Aguilar absent and Councilman John McCann voting against the increase.
McCann did not explain on the dais why he voted against the raise and several phone messages seeking comment went unanswered.
Mayor Mary Casillas Salas said she supported the item because the provisions in the charter set the salaries.
“We don’t ask for those raises at all,” the mayor said. “As a matter of fact, the voters of Chula Vista voted to take (the) matter of raises away from us by an overwhelming majority when the proposition passed the ballot.”
Councilman Steve Miesen also voted in favor of a salary increase, saying raises come few and far between.
“The increase is not an annual increase,” he said. “You might be increased this year and you might not get an increase next year, so we’re just tied to that mechanism.”
The item was placed on the consent calendar, but was pulled for discussion.
Longtime Chula Vista resident Steve Pavka spoke out against the item.
“’I’m glad to hear that we’re finally out of our money problems, that you now have money to give yourselves a big raise,” he told the council.
“There are other things (more important) other than you or your paychecks,” he said.
Chula Vista resident Russ Hall has previously stated that as a taxpayer he wants a refund for the abundance of cancelled meetings and for what he characterized as an unproductive council.
He agreed with Pavka that there are more pressing needs in the city other than a pay raise.
“It’s interesting that the city manager is asking for $600 million for infrastructure repair, and we don’t have the money to pay for it, supposedly,” Hall said. “And so he is asking the voters to back a (potential) bond initiative to pay for infrastructure; yet we find money for pay raises for people who are cancelling meetings right and left and at an unprecedented level. Something doesn’t add up here.”
Hall said he understands the raises aren’t being asked for by the mayor and council, that voters passed a proposition that sets pay based on a superior court judge’s salary.
However, he said, the council did not have to approve the increase.
Googins said the council did have the authority to vote down the increase.
“They could (not approve it) but it would be an unusual thing to do,” he said.
Googins added that not approving the pay hike would put the city out of compliance with the city’s charter.
Googins said the vote had to take place in public because CalPERS has a regulation saying cities that are members of
CalPERS must make any action set to increase salaries public.
Before that regulation went into effect Googins said raises would kick in automatically once the superior court judges got theirs.
The money for the salary increases will come from the city’s general fund and staff will look for offsetting funds in the current budget.
