Criticism of council pay misses point

A recent article in the Cape Breton Post stated that “Cape Breton Regional Municipality (CBRM) councillors have approved their own raise” and that pay hike would cost taxpayers “about $140,000 annually.”

My headline would have gone something like this: ‘Trudeau Liberals, desperate for votes, remove the tax-free salary allowance for elected municipal official’s nationwide; what does it mean for municipal taxpayers?’

What it means had already been answered by Jennifer Campbell, the municipality’s chief financial officer, who summed it up as follows: the increases will cost the CBRM an estimated $35,000 during the 2018-19 fiscal year and about $140,000 annually thereafter.

It was apparent to me when the Liberals announced the removal of the tax-free salary allowance for elected municipal officials, municipalities who would suffer. And when I say municipalities, I mean every citizen nationwide.

I also knew that elected officials would bare the brunt of the criticism; not the federal government.

I don’t go out s much, but I had to do some running around recently and everywhere I went council’s salaries was the topic. It was ugly with an abundance of anti-council comments. But that’s what we get when the commentators only scratch the surface of a political topic, rather than scratch their heads.

Some quick, but necessary background for those who bother to read this letter. Elected council members nationwide received a portion of their salaries tax free. This was not new and it has been that way for many years.

When people hear the words “tax-free salary,” given how most of us believe we are overtaxed, they get upset. Hence the question: why do they get some of their salary tax free? The answer is quite simple. It keep the costs of governance down.

Before we jump all over our council members, one should consider looking at several aspects of this pay hike. It was recommended by the Nova Scotia Federation of Municipalities to offset the Trudeau government’s move to eliminate the tax-free status that elected officials have received for many years.

The measure CBRM council (and other councils) took would not have been necessary had the federal government not removed the tax-free salary allowance. Why? Because there would have been no new cost to the municipalities tax payers.

The mayor and councillors are not getting a net pay increase and their new gross pay rate resulted from an accounting review that identified the gross pay increase required to see that they received the same net pay after taxes were calculated.

In my opinion, the fall-out from this entire affair rests entirely on the shoulders of federal government officials, not our elected municipal council members.

When the mayor and councillors offered their names up for election, they knew the financial reward, if elected, just like we do when we accept a job that is subject to a contract. No one would accept a pay cut imposed on them by a separate entity. Thus I do not agree that our elected officials should have been arbitrarily subjected to a decrease in their takehome pay.

The feds caused this, not our councillors.

Pat Reid

Glace Bay