Raises OK’d for assessor, sheriff, DA

Supervisors grant immediate raises and tie future raises for the officials to a state index

SAN JOSE » While Santa Clara County’s top executives and other employees have regularly been getting raises, the county’s elected assessor, district attorney and sheriff haven’t received one since 2015 and say it’s about time,

“I’d like to say right up front that I’m adequately compensated. I’m not crying poverty,” longtime county Assessor Larry Stone told the Board of Supervisors. “I am not however, fairly compensated.”

Stone said despite being elected to run a department that generates significant tax revenue for the county, his earnings are “equivalent to a deputy or assistant department head or less.”

“My compensation is frozen at number three … there’s no path for me to move up,” Stone added. “Effectively, the policy puts my compensation on a permanent, downward trend.”

After Stone delivered his impassioned plea, the supervisors voted to give him a 6.69 percent raise and Sheriff Laurie Smith and District Attorney Jeff Rosen 3.69 percent each.

Over the last six years, county executives have received average raises of 3.4 percent and other employee groups 2.5 to 3 percent.

Stone got an annual salary of $230,231 and $72,000 in benefits for a total compensation of $307,983 in 2017, according to the website Transparent California. During the same year, Smith got an annual salary of $289,197 and about $132,245 in benefits for a total compensation of $421,443, and Rosen got an annual salary of $343,760 and $105,355 in benefits for a total compensation of $454,082.

Smith, who did not attend the board meeting, didn’t directly address her own salary in a memo to the board but included a graph

I’d like to say right up front that I’m adequately compensated. I’m not crying poverty. I am not however, fairly compensated.” — County Assessor Larry Stone

showing a 3 percent gap, or $8,600, between her maximum salary and the undersheriff’s.

The same graph showed a $36,000 gap between the district attorney and the next position below him, and a $ 26,800 gap between the assessor and assistant assessor.

“Salaries should reflect the chain of command and increased responsibility for higher job classifications,” Smith’s memo states.

Raises for Santa Clara County supervisors are currently linked to the same process used by the Judicial Council of California to calculate salary increases for state judges. If the average wage increase for state workers is 3 percent, state judges also get a 3 percent raise.

A county ordinance stipulates supervisors will receive an annual salary that is 80 percent of the annual salary of state superior court judges.

The board, however, controls salary increases for their three elected peers.

In his own memo, Rosen said tying raises to the Judicial Council would remove the board from that decision- making process and better for account cost- of-living increases.

Supervisor Mike Wasserman made a motion to give immediate raises to the three elected officials and tie future salary increases to the Judicial Council process.

“I think they are due a raise, and if there are three votes, we give them that raise as soon as the law allows,” Wasserman said. “If the judges don’t give themselves a raise for a couple of years…then it would be six years since they receive a raise.”

Wasserman said he proposed a bigger raise for the assessor after comparing Stone’s salary to other assessors’ statewide.

“I saw more disparity between our assessor and his peers than I saw between our DA and sheriff,” Wasserman said. “It’s a little bit of a realignment.”

The vote was 3-2 to approve the raises, with supervisors Joe Simitian and Dave Cortese dissenting because although they support tying the raises to the Judicial Council process, they didn’t want the increases to go into effect immediately.

The board still needs to vote two more times to approve the change, which would allow the raises to kick in May 23.