Mayor Pugh to pay her top staff $805,000

Baltimore Mayor Catherine E. Pugh, who was inaugurated Tuesday, will pay her five top advisers a total of about $805,000.

Her chief of staff, former schools CEO Tisha Edwards, is to be paid $190,000, which is $19,000 more than Pugh’s salary. Former Del. Peter Hammen, Pugh’s chief of operations, and former Baltimore County executive James T. Smith Jr., her chief of strategic alliances, will each make $175,000.

Karen Stokes, director of government relations, will be paid $137,000. Anthony McCarthy, director of communications, will get $127,500. He earned $125,00 as part of Rawlings-Blake’s team.

Pugh restructured the mayor’s executive staff after her inauguration. Under Stephanie Rawlings-Blake, the mayor’s office had four deputy mayors, a chief of staff, deputy chief of staff and communications director.

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She paid her senior staff a combined $1 million. It is unclear how much Pugh will pay in overall staffing salaries compared to Rawlings-Black for all of the mayor’s office functions

Rawlings-Blake paid her chief of staff, Kaliope Parthemos, $186,150 and her deputy chief of staff, Kimberly Morton, $140,000. Her deputy mayors were paid between $127,500 and $167,900.

Pugh will save $344,000 by eliminating four senior level staff members, according to her office. She will not replace Gus Augustus, who earned about $100,000 as a neighborhood liaison, or Leon F. Pinkett III, who earned about $96,000 as an economic development liaison. Pinkett was just elected to the City Council.

Two of Rawlings-Blake’s deputy mayors still work for the city. Andrew Smullian, whose title under Rawlings-Blake was deputy mayor for government relations and labor, will work for Pugh through early next year. He is paid $142,300.

Colin Tarbert, Rawlings-Blake’s deputy mayor for economic and neighborhood development, will work as an assistant to Smith on Pugh’s economic development team. He will continue to be paid $151,600.

Parthemos and two deputy mayors have left the administration.

In the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice, Pugh replaced Neal Janey with Olivia Schnitzer. Janey made $127,500. Schnitzer is to be paid more than $94,000.

Pugh has indicated that she will keep Health Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen, Police Commissioner Kevin Davis and Fire Chief Niles Ford.

Pugh plans to fire Housing Commissioner Paul T. Graziano.