Pay lowest commission priority: Councillors

Saskatoon city council’s executive committee has endorsed the creation of an independent commission to review municipal election rules, a code of conduct for elected officials and councillor remuneration.

Councillors at Monday’s monthly meeting said the commission’s first priority should be to review election rules well in advance of the October 2016 civic election, while review of councillor remuneration should be the lowest priority.

Coun. Charlie Clark said he’s happy to leave a discussion about councillor compensation “to the end,” but “there’s merit” in having the conversation.

“The city’s changing and it’s not a matter of how much do councillors get paid, I think it’s about what’s the best role for councillors to be playing in terms of providing and being able to do the work of serving the citizens they represent,” he told the committee.

“If we did this just on pure salary, we probably would get reductions because we get paid actually more than Regina and more than some other cities, but there’s the other questions about the communications allowance, the support staff, facilities, equipment for members of council, the demands on being able to keep up with communication.”

Coun. Ann Iwanchuk said councillors aren’t looking for a raise, but said a remuneration committee could review the current model of councillors’ salaries.

Under the current model, salaries for councillors and the mayor are calculated based on provincial cabinet ministers’ pay. Last year, the mayor made $119,171, which is 85 per cent of what a cabinet minister earns. Councillors brought in $53,867, which is 45 per cent of the mayor’s salary.

“Maybe the salary shouldn’t be tied to an MLA salary,” Iwanchuk told the committee.

“Not to say it should be a different salary, but maybe it should be tied to some average of city staff salary or something.”

Any recommendations made by the independent commission would still have to be approved by council because the provincial Cities Act gives municipal councils control over those decisions.

Mayor Don Atchison said if a commission is struck, council will just “rubber stamp” its decisions.

“It’s just a matter of accepting the recommendations, good, bad or indifferent,” he said.

City administrators have recommended an independent commission form three distinct committees to deal with municipal election rules, a code of conduct and councillor remuneration.

If council votes to approve bylaw changes to allow the independent commission to operate, a municipal election rules committee will meet in March and report back to council by August.