Alectra board pay has pumped up Hamilton mayor’s salary
Fred Eisenberger earned an extra $40,416 for sitting on the newly amalgamated Alectra hydro board last year
Mayor Fred Eisenberger’s utility board earnings bumped his overall pay above $221,000 last year.
The mayor earned $40,416 last year for sitting on the hydro board of newly formed Alectra Utilities and heading an associated subcommittee, according to 2017 salary and expenses information released for council members.
That stipend comes atop the taxable mayoral salary of $181,042. Eisenberger also filed $14,498 in expenses related mostly to travel for conferences, events and meetings.
Combined, those earnings made Eisenberger one of the top-paid mayors in Ontario and Canada last year.
The mayor said this week he considers the compensation for both jobs “reasonable” but added his position on the newly amalgamated hydro board is “additional” to the duties of mayor.
“It’s not the same as sitting on a city committee or board,” he said, pointing as an example to his unpaid position as a Hamilton Police Services Board member.
Mississauga Mayor Bonnie Crombie topped her Hamilton counterpart with $243,117 in total pay in 2017 thanks partly to her own Alectra stipend of $48,613. That came on top of city and Region of Peel salaries of $139,374 and $55,130, respectively.
Also in the compensation ballpark are the mayors of Calgary and Edmonton, Naheed Nenshi and Don Iveson, each of whom make a mayoral salary of about $200,000 — that’s after recent pay cuts in both cities.
The merger of Hamilton’s Horizon Utilities, Enersource, PowerStream and Hydro One Brampton created one of the largest municipally owned utilities in Canada last year, serving 15 communities. Eisenberger and other mayors appointed to the new hydro board fielded criticism last year at the perceived high level of pay, with some colleagues even suggesting he donate his stipend to the hydro arrears fund. The mayor said he made “private” donations to charity last year but did not specifically give away his hydro stipend. He argued city politicians have historically been paid to sit on hydro boards including the Hamilton Utilities Corporation. (Ward 10 Coun. Maria Pearson made $16,500 to sit on that board last year. She estimated she gave away 30 per cent of that stipend to charitable groups in or around her Stoney Creek ward based on last year’s suggestion from her colleagues.)
Eisenberger noted he did not set the Alectra board stipend rate
but suggested the wider reach of the second-largest utility in Ontario creates more work and responsibilities for board members. The board of Toronto Hydro, the largest municipal utility in Canada, offers the same compensation as Alectra for board chair ($75,000), a $12,500 member retainer plus $1,000 a meeting up to a maximum of $30,000 annually.
Each city councillor last year made a taxable salary of $95,448 and together council members filed $35,240 in expenses. The bulk of those expenses were eaten
up by flights and hotels for out-of-town conferences and mileage. Ward 11 councillor Brenda Johnson again topped the mileage charts with $4,786 claimed for driving to appointments around the sprawling ward that covers Glanbrook and parts of Stoney Creek.
To see detailed lists of council expenses, check out the online report under the March 26 audit, finance and administration committee agenda at hamilton.ca