It appears that the most likely outcome for this year is that those salaries will remain level for the next two years.

The LOCC meeting took place at 2:30 p.m. in the third floor conference room of the Ann Arbor city hall. Eunice Burns and Roger Hewitt are the only two members of the seven-member commission who are appointed and serving, and they both attended the meeting. Burns is a former city councilmember and a former member of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority (DDA) board. Hewitt currently serves on the DDA board. The DDA connection is coincidental.

Assistant city attorney Mary Fales attended the Dec. 16 meeting as well, and after taking a roll call, declared that a quorum, which consists of four members, had not been achieved. So Burns and Hewitt voted immediately to adjourn the meeting. The total time for the meeting was about 2 minutes –  28 minutes less than the half hour Burns remarked she’d put on her parking meter.

Fales told Burns and Hewitt at the meeting that when the file of applications for the LOCC was reviewed, no eligible applications were identified.

Hewitt asked Fales to apprise him, the chair of the commission, if additional members are appointed before the end of the year, which would allow the commission to meet and achieve a quorum. Those appointments would need to be made at the city council’s meeting later today (Dec. 16, 2013), the last regular meeting of the council scheduled for this year. That appears somewhat unlikely.

The seven-member LOCC is supposed to meet every odd-numbered year and make a salary determination for the next two years. The commission is not allowed to meet in an even-numbered year. The LOCC’s determination takes effect unless rejected by the city council. If the determination is rejected, then the salaries remain the same as they were.

Before the LOCC meeting, Fales told The Chronicle that she assumed the salaries would stay the same if the LOCC made no determination. The statute and ordinance make explicit that if the city council rejects the LOCC determination, then the salaries remain unchanged.

However, neither the state enabling statute nor the city’s ordinance (based that statute) appear to give any explicit guidance about what is supposed to happen if no determination is made by the LOCC in a given year. The Ann Arbor LOCC makes salary determinations for just two years at a time. So the determination made by the LOCC two years ago was only for 2012 and 2013. The Ann Arbor city charter stipulates that councilmembers serve without pay – but the procedure to set salaries through an LOCC supersedes the city charter.

The fact that Ann Arbor’s LOCC has an inadequate number of members has been known for some time. At the 2011 meeting of the Ann Arbor’s LOCC, commissioners talked about the three vacancies at that time. In the interim, the terms of Bill Lockwood and Martha Darling, who were appointed and serving in 2011 – have expired. The appointments of Burns and Hewitt will expire in October of 2014, so 2013 year will be their last year of active service unless they are reappointed. [For more detailed Chronicle coverage of the issue, see: "Column: What Do We Pay Ann Arbor's Mayor?"]

This brief was filed from the conference room on the third floor of city hall, located at 301 E. Huron.

History of Ann Arbor city councilmember and mayor salaries as determined by a process involving the LOCC and the Ann Arbor city council.

One of the questions surely weighed by any potential candidate for Ann Arbor mayor is purely practical: What does the Ann Arbor mayor get paid? The $42,436 mayoral salary would, for some of us, represent a significant increase in annual income. For others, it would reflect a dramatic pay cut. A councilmember’s salary, at $15,913, is considerably less than the mayor’s.

My point in writing today is not to explore the policy question of mayoral or councilmember salaries. That’s a question ultimately determined by a public body called the local officers compensation commission (LOCC). The seven-member LOCC is supposed to meet every odd-numbered year and make a salary determination for the next two years. That determination takes effect unless rejected by the city council. If it’s rejected, then the salaries remain the same as they were.

A check of the calendar shows that this year is odd-numbered. And it turns out that as far as the LOCC is concerned, it is also an odd year. One odd thing is that the LOCC has not yet convened a meeting, with just about two weeks left in 2013. However, a notice came through from the city clerk’s office this week that a meeting of the LOCC is now scheduled for Dec. 16, 2013 at 2:30 p.m. in the third floor conference room of the Ann Arbor city hall – located at 301 E. Huron St. in downtown Ann Arbor.

The other odd thing is that if you attend that meeting, you will not see a seven-member public body convened around a conference room table deliberating toward a salary determination. Instead you’ll likely see just two commissioners – Eunice Burns and Roger Hewitt. The city’s online Legistar system shows them as the only members of the LOCC who have current appointments. Burns is a former city councilmember and a former member of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority (DDA) board. Hewitt currently serves on the DDA board. The DDA connection is coincidental.

So my point in writing is to reflect on this question: Why does anyone think it’s reasonable, let alone legal, that the seven-member body responsible for determining mayor and council salaries could convene a meeting – with only two members who are appointed and serving? 

What Is a Quorum?

Ann Arbor’s local ordinance establishing a local officers compensation commission is based on the state’s enabling legislation. The state statute allowed cities to establish an LOCC and override salary provisions in city charters – without amending the city charter. That’s why Ann Arbor city councilmembers are able to receive an annual salary of almost $16,000, even though the city charter clearly states: “Each member of the Council, except the Mayor, shall serve without pay.”

The state enabling statute, and the local ordinance on which it is based, both clearly establish that Ann Arbor’s LOCC is supposed to have seven members. From the city ordinance:

The commission shall consist of 7 members who are registered electors of the city, appointed by the Mayor, subject to confirmation by a majority of the members elected and serving in the City Council.

The size of Ann Arbor’s seven-member LOCC follows from its population of roughly 114,000 and the state statute:

The commission shall consist of 5 members in a city of 20,000 population or less and 7 members in a city of over 20,000 population. The members shall be registered electors of the city, appointed by the mayor subject to confirmation by a majority of the members elected and serving in the legislative body.

So, what constitutes a quorum for this commission? That is: What’s the minimum number of commission members needed to convene a meeting at which business can be conducted?

Both the state statute and the city ordinance have identical language:

A majority of the members of the commission constitute a quorum for conducting the business of the commission. The commission shall take no action or make determinations without a concurrence of a majority of the members appointed and serving on the commission.

Here’s the same passage with added bolding and letters in parens to help identify phrases in the discussion below:

A (a) majority of the members of the commission constitute a quorum for conducting the business of the commission. The commission shall take no action or make determinations without a concurrence of a (b) majority of the members appointed and serving on the commission.

To arrive at an actual number of people necessary for a quorum, we must interpret (a).

1. Does (a) mean a majority of the prescribed number of commissioners? If it does, then (a) means the majority of seven (i.e., at least four commissioners).
2. Or does (a) mean a majority of those commissioners who have current appointments? If that’s what it means, then it translates into a majority of two (i.e., at least two commissioners).

A basic principle of statutory construction is that the law should be interpreted so as to avoid rendering superfluous any statutory language. I’m relying on a Congressional Research Service report from 2008 for support of that principle.  So by including “appointed and serving” in (b), the legislature should be assumed to have meant something that’s not merely superfluous through its inclusion.

But if the phrase “majority of the members” alone meant the same thing as “majority of the members appointed and serving,” then the inclusion of “appointed and serving” would be made superfluous. Thus, assigning an interpretation of (a) that is the same as the interpretation of (b) would disregard that basic principle of statutory construction.

Therefore, the definition of a quorum in (a) is not correctly interpreted as (b). So the definition of a quorum is not the “majority of members appointed and serving on the commission.” In terms of the numbering above, the interpretation in (2) is ruled out.

The only other reasonable candidate for the set of people to whom (a) refers is the majority of the prescribed number of members – i.e, at least four of seven. So the correct interpretation must be (1) above.

A simpler argument is based on a different principle of statutory construction: Avoid interpretations that lead to an absurd result. The interpretation (2) above leads to the absurd result that even a commission consisting of one appointed and serving member would be sufficient for a quorum to “meet” and determine mayoral and councilmember salaries.

I think it’s reasonable to ask: If legislators meant four, why didn’t they just say “four”? I think this is best explained by the fact that this boilerplate language works equally well for a body of any particular size.  And that explanation finds support in the language of the statute itself. The state statute contemplates LOCCs of two different sizes – one size (five members) for cities less than 20,000 in population and another size (seven members) for cities more than 20,000 in population. So rather than lay out twice the definition of a quorum – once for five-member LOCCs and again for seven-member LOCCs – the statute is crafted in a way that works equally well for both sizes of LOCC.

While reasonable minds can differ, I don’t think this is one of those gray areas where it can be reasonably argued that the two currently appointed and serving members of Ann Arbor’s LOCC could possibly achieve a quorum to conduct business.

Who Can Serve?

Of the two members of Ann Arbor’s LOCC with a current appointment, only one appears to be eligible – Eunice Burns.

Because he’s a current member of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority board, I don’t think Roger Hewitt is eligible to serve on the LOCC. That’s because Ann Arbor’s LOCC ordinance reads in pertinent part:

No member or employee of the legislative, judicial or executive branch of any level of government or members of the immediate family of such member or employee shall be eligible to be a member of the commission.

One way a question like this can be settled is by obtaining an opinion from the Michigan’s attorney general. Elected state officials can request such an opinion, although the AG is not required to write one.

A couple of years ago, The Chronicle asked Alma Wheeler Smith, who was a state representative at the time, to request a formal opinion from the state attorney general answering the question: Can a member of a downtown development authority board serve on a local officers compensation commission? She agreed, and the AG indicated at that time that an opinion would be written. But before any opinion on the matter was issued, Wheeler Smith left office. And when we contacted the AG’s office later to check on the status of that opinion, the AG’s office had no record of the matter.

So we renewed the effort this year, with state representative Jeff Irwin. Irwin agreed to request the opinion, but this time the AG’s office explicitly declined to write one. However, I think there are three reasonable arguments that the Ann Arbor DDA functions as part of a branch of Ann Arbor’s local government.

First, in connection with the debate about the calculation of DDA TIF (tax increment finance) capture that has unfolded over the last two years, the city attorney’s office has contended that the DDA is the entity that’s responsible for the interpretation and application of Chapter 7 of the city code. From that it follows that the DDA is part of the city’s executive branch of government.

Second, the DDA is characterized in the city’s annual formal audit as a “component unit” of the city. That again points to the DDA’s status as a part of the city’s government.

And third, mayor John Hieftje has repeatedly and emphatically insisted that the DDA is an “arm of the city” – based on the kind of activity and actions the DDA has taken historically. That again points to an analysis of the DDA as a part of the executive branch of the city government.

Earlier this spring I communicated those three arguments in an email to city attorney Stephen Postema and several councilmembers, including Hieftje. [.pdf of May 9, 2013 email to city attorney Stephen Postema]

Falling Through the Cracks?

That May 9, 2013 email also alerted Postema and Hieftje, who makes the nominations to the LOCC, that the LOCC had at that time only two appointed members. From the email:

It’s worth noting that besides Hewitt, the city’s Legistar system indicates only one other member of the seven­ member LOCC has a current appointment (Eunice Burns). Given that the LOCC is required to meet sometime this year and make a recommendation on city council and mayoral salaries (as 2013 is an odd­-numbered year), we’d encourage you to advise your client in a timely fashion, so that the necessary appointments can be made to the LOCC.

The last time the LOCC met, back in 2011, the LOCC had only four members. The Chronicle’s coverage included the following [from "No Raises for Ann Arbor Mayor, Council"]:

Before the meeting was convened, as the commissioners were waiting for their full complement to arrive, they reflected on the fact that three vacancies exist on the seven-member body.

Mary Fales reported that there are not even three applications on file. She indicated that she’d informed the city clerk of the vacancies. But Bill Lockwood indicated that he’d been looking for vacancy listings for a different body and had not seen any vacancies listed for the LOCC. …

About the lack of applications, Eunice Burns said: “If no one knows, no one will apply.”

So I think the lack of adequate membership on the LOCC can be fairly described as an issue that the city’s leadership could have and should have known about. And neither Hieftje, nor anyone else, has taken action that’s resulted in filling the vacant positions on the LOCC.

Filling Potholes, Vacancies

During his unsuccessful campaign this year to win election to city council representing Ward 2, Kirk Westphal talked about the idea that filling every last pothole shouldn’t be a barrier to planning for and investing in the future:

Yet we’ve heard council members who have invoked all manner of excuses not to invest in our future. Excuses inspired by Sisyphus: We shouldn’t invest in the future until we have filled every pothole.

Accepting Westphal’s position, the analogy I would draw to the LOCC is this: Generally we should not rend our garments and raise lamentation to the sky that our local governance is some kind of abject failure, just because we have not filled every last vacancy on every one of the city’s myriad boards and commissions.

But when we can manage to fill just two out of seven potholes – on a road we’ve been driving for at least the last two years, somehow managing to ignore those bumps – then I think it’s fair to register complaint.

The LOCC is not just some obscure advisory body – some kind of tiny side street – with no real impact on our governance. If the LOCC were to make a determination that the mayor’s salary should be increased from roughly $42,000 to $60,000, then that’s what the mayor of Ann Arbor would be paid – unless the city council took action to reject that increase.

So what are Burns and Hewitt supposed to do next Monday, Dec. 16? If they’re advised by the city attorney’s office that they constitute a quorum and can meet and make a salary determination, then they’d likely feel they were shirking their duty not to do exactly that.

What choice do they have?

On Dec. 16 at 2:30 p.m., I think they have the choice to do what members of any public body can do if at the appointed hour for a meeting no quorum is achieved: Take reasonable measures to try to achieve one. In this case, I think those measures would include communicating to Hieftje that at least two more members need to be appointed to the LOCC so that the LOCC can achieve a quorum.

Later that same day, at 7 p.m. the city council will convene its last regular meeting of the year. At that meeting, the council could confirm nominations to the LOCC in a one-step process, if there’s an eight-vote majority. After those appointments were made the LOCC could meet and make salary determinations.

I’m not particularly enthusiastic about using a rushed process to appoint even just two additional LOCC members – because they serve seven-year terms.

But here’s a link to the application form anyway: [.pdf of standard city board and commission task force application]

A couple of applications could at least serve as something analogous to a wheelbarrow full of cold patch. But the mayor and council will need to do their part – and take action to tamp down that tar and gravel to fill the holes.

The Chronicle could not survive without regular voluntary subscriptions to support our coverage of public bodies like the local officers compensation commission. Click this link for details: Subscribe to The Chronicle. And if you’re already helping The Chronicle fill its own potholes, please encourage your friends, neighbors and colleagues to help support The Chronicle, too!

During the course of 2011, mayor John Hieftje did not appoint anyone to fill the two vacancies. And since that time, a third vacancy has been added. However in this report, The Chronicle makes good on its promise to cover the commission’s only meeting this year.

Ann Arbor local officers compensation commission (Dec. 16, 2011): Salaries for Ann Arbor’s mayor and 10 city councilmembers will remain constant for the next two years at $42,436 and $15,913, respectively. That was the conclusion of the four members on the local officers compensation commission (LOCC), who met Friday morning for around a half hour.

Ann Arbor mayor and councilmember salaries from 2000 through 2013. The local officers compensation commission's recommendation, made at its Dec. 16, 2011 meeting, means that salaries will stay constant from 2009 through 2013. (Image links to higher resolution .jpg file)

Commission members cited the down economy as a main reason for not bumping the salaries higher. They discussed the fact that a flat salary, even with little inflation, translates into a pay cut – which was also a possibility they briefly mentioned.

The seven-member body currently has just four members, because no appointments have been made by the mayor to fill vacancies. Attending the meeting were Martha Darling, William Lockwood, Roger Hewitt and Eunice Burns. Hewitt chaired the commission two years ago when it last met, and he was again drafted by his commission colleagues to serve as chair this year.

The  LOCC is required to meet in odd-numbered years, so this year is a required meeting year. The LOCC makes a recommendation to the city council – a decision that automatically takes effect unless the city council votes to reject it. The council does not need to take affirmative action to approve the LOCC recommendation. 

2011 Commission Deliberations

After the roll call and approval of the agenda, the first order of business on the Dec. 16 agenda was the selection of a chair.

2011 Commission Deliberations: Selection of Chair

Until that point, Roger Hewitt, the chair held over from the commission’s 2009 session, had presided over the meeting. Hewitt was nominated again to serve as the chair, with Bill Lockwood saying, “It’s a fine nomination!” For his part, Hewitt displayed little enthusiasm for the role, asking: “Don’t the members think it might be good to rotate?” They did not, and Hewitt accepted the chore his commission colleagues assigned to him.

Responding to the suggestion that Hewitt could record his chairship on his resumé, Hewitt quipped that very few people his age are polishing up resumés. But he then allowed that in the currently down economy, there might be more people his age doing that than in the past.

The down economy factored into commissioners’ thinking when they eventually recommended that salaries for councilmembers and the mayor remain the same.

2011 Commission Deliberations: Timeframe; Information Packet

As they began to consider their task, commissioners observed that they needed to complete their work not later than Dec. 31. After establishing Dec. 19 as a possible additional meeting date – if they did not arrive at a consensus during the current meeting – Hewitt encouraged his colleagues: “Let’s see if we can complete our work.”

Assistant city attorney Mary Fales, who provides staff support for the commission, reviewed the information in the packet that she’d compiled for the commission’s review. The list of comparable cities in the packet consisted of Lansing, Livonia, Southfield, Sterling Heights, Westland, Taylor and Dearborn.

Fales advised that the salary information for all seven cities was not included, because the database from which she drew the information – from the Michigan Municipal League (MML) – was based on voluntary submission of data by league member cities. Data from Southfield, Lansing, and Taylor were missing from the list. [.pdf of charts from MML database provided to the commission]

The commission did not discuss how the comparable cities were chosen or the fact that just two of the seven comparables have council-manager forms of government like Ann Arbor’s – Southfield and Sterling Heights. [The other five have "strong mayor" forms – in which the mayor manages the city day-to-day. In a council-manager form of government, the city council hires a city administrator to oversee day-to-day operations for the city.]

Sterling Heights (with a population slightly larger than Ann Arbor, at around 124,000) is the one council-manager city for which comparable salary data was provided to the commission. Sterling Heights’ mayor earns $19,754, compared to $42,436 for Ann Arbor. Other cities on the comparables list (with strong mayor forms of government) showed correspondingly higher salaries for the position of mayor. For example, Livonia’s mayor is paid $105,000 annually, and Dearborn’s mayor is paid $131,133.

Information in the packet also included compensation for Ann Arbor District Library board of trustees ($30 per meeting), Ann Arbor Public Schools board of trustees ($130/month) and Washtenaw County board of commissioners ($15,500 annual salary and $25/meeting per diem).

The packet prepared by Fales also included community profiles for the seven cities downloaded from the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments (SEMCOG) website: Ann Arbor; Livonia; Southfield; Sterling Heights; Westland; Taylor; and Dearborn.

Fales also provided the determination from the last LOCC session for reference. The determination in 2009 was to keep salaries constant.

Commission Deliberations: Lower, Higher, Flat?

Bill Lockwood led off deliberations by saying he thought it’s highly unlikely that there could be a salary increase in the current circumstance. The only issue, he felt, is whether councilmembers and the mayor should share in the pain by taking a decrease, “like other folks are taking.” He asked if city staff were taking a reduction or whether the city is simply losing people. Responding to Lockwood’s question, Martha Darling ventured that the reduction in compensation experienced by city staff have been mostly on the benefits side.

Left to right: assistant city attorney Mary Fales, and LOCC members Martha Darling, Bill Lockwood, Roger Hewitt and Eunice Burns.

Roger Hewitt observed that the LOCC deals only with salary. Hewitt wanted to know if there’d been any increase in city employee wages in the last year or two. Fales indicated that for non-union employees, there had been no increases. She also left the room briefly to confirm with the city’s labor attorney that union employees, in all the recently settled contracts, had not received any wage increases beyond the “step increases” that have historically been a part of those contracts.

Darling pointed out that in Ann Arbor’s salary history, Fales had included a footnote indicating that the mayor and some councilmembers voluntarily “gave back” 3% of their salary one year. Lockwood observed that the 3% figure came from the 3% increase that the LOCC had recommended in 2007, which councilmembers did not reject.

By way of background, not all councilmembers who made the public announcement in early 2010 that they’d give back 3% of their salaries followed through – until The Chronicle inquired about the status of promised give-back payments. From an April 29, 2011 Chronicle column:

On Feb. 22, 2011 – more than a year after the public promises were made – The Chronicle inquired with the city’s financial office about the status of those payments. Not all had paid. But by March 7, 2011, all those who said they’d participate had finally made good on their commitment – it took The Chronicle’s inquiry to get them to follow through. According to city staff, it had been the expectation of some councilmembers that they would be invoiced with an incremental payment plan. And apparently when they didn’t receive an invoice from the city, they didn’t have the discipline to make the payments on their own.

Responding to the mention of the voluntary give-back, Hewitt noted that the council would have its own political discussion. He said he’d suggest a nominal cost-of-living increase or keeping it flat. He indicated he didn’t believe it was possible to increase salaries substantially. Lockwood noted that inflation, though relatively low recently, did the work of reducing wages, if they left salaries flat.

Returning to the issue of the lack of any increase for city employee salaries, commissioners also noted that staff reductions meant that the same amount of work was getting done with fewer people. As the mood in the room seemed to verge on entertaining a recommendation to reduce mayoral and councilmember salaries, Hewitt ventured that the LOCC could not actually make such a recommendation. Responding to Hewitt, Fales indicated that recommending a salary reduction is within the purview of the LOCC.

Lockwood said that even though Fales was recording the minutes for the meeting, he wanted her to include how wonderful the information packet was. Fales is to be complimented for that, he said.

Returning to the issue of salary, Lockwood said he couldn’t see any possibility that he’d vote for an increase. He then moved that the recommendation of the commission be to continue the current salaries for the mayor and councilmembers at $42,436 and $15,913, respectively, for the next two years.

Eunice Burns suggested using the same paragraph from the 2009 session’s determination:

The LOCC has determined that no increase in salary is appropriate for the mayor, mayor pro tem, and members of the city council. The salary determination for local elected officials is responsive to the present economic climate and is not reflective of the time, energy and leadership roles that the mayor and members of city council have and continue to participate in regional and state levels.

Picking up on the “leadership roles” phrase in the paragraph, Darling noted that leadership on transit and establishing a rail corridor had reflected real progress, which is befitting one of the few counties in Michigan that is doing arguable better than the rest of the state. Darling said the council and mayor are really doing important work within a constrained budget situation. Lockwood commented that it’s sad that “we are where we are.” Darling ventured that increasing salaries would not be possible until there’s a broader economic recovery.

Burns related the feedback that she’d received from a party she’d attended the previous night. When she floated the idea of raises to other attendees, she reported, everyone said: No! Burns added those she had asked were all good Democrats.

Lockwood said he hoped that the next time the LOCC meets, in 2013, commissioners would be looking at an economy that’s starting to blossom. Hewitt commented that comparing what mayors make in other Michigan cities, Ann Arbor can’t compensate what’s appropriate. The economic reality is, Hewitt said, “standing still means you’re taking a pay cut.” Darling noted that people aren’t taking on the job of mayor and councilmembers for the money. She said it’s fortunate that the city has people of high quality taking on the work.

Hewitt ventured that the wage per hour wouldn’t be very high. Darling came back to the suggestion from Burns that they use similar language to the 2009 determination, because it again captured the right sentiment. About our elected officials, Darling suggested that, “In our regular lives when we run into them, we should thank them.”

Outcome: The commission voted unanimously to recommend that salaries for the Ann Arbor mayor and councilmembers stay at current levels for 2012 and 2013.

After offering an opportunity for public commentary (no one other than The Chronicle attended) Hewitt accepted a motion to adjourn, the commission voted to end its meeting, and with that the commission’s work was done for another two years.

LOCC Membership: “If no one knows, no one will apply.”

Before the meeting was convened, as the commissioners were waiting for their full complement to arrive, they reflected on the fact that three vacancies exist on the seven-member body.

Mary Fales reported that there are not even three applications on file. She indicated that she’d informed the city clerk of the vacancies. But Bill Lockwood indicated that he’d been looking for vacancy listings for a different body and had not seen any vacancies listed for the LOCC.

By way of background, the city’s online Legistar system that organizes meetings of boards and commissions includes a module for the current and past membership of boards and commissions. The module is sometimes not immediately updated. The currently listed vacancies do not include the three for the LOCC.

About the lack of applications, Eunice Burns said: “If no one knows, no one will apply.”

One hurdle to recruiting members of the commission is that eligibility for service on the LOCC is constrained more than for some other citizen boards and commissions. From Ann Arbor’s ordinance:

The members [of the LOCC] shall be registered electors of the city, appointed by the mayor subject to confirmation by a majority of the members elected and serving in the legislative body. … No member or employee of the legislative, judicial or executive branch of any level of government or members of the immediate family of such member or employee shall be eligible to be a member of the commission.

In the time since The Chronicle reported on the local officers compensation commission in early 2011, the third vacancy that has accumulated on the LOCC  is the spot left by local attorney Fred McDonald, whose term expired on Nov. 21, 2011. His son, Kevin, is employed by the city as an assistant city attorney, and he thus appears to have been ineligible to serve on the LOCC. [See "Ann Arbor City Council Service: What's It Worth?"]

Current member Roger Hewitt also serves on the board of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority. And Lockwood serves on the city’s board of canvassers. [.pdf of membership on all Ann Arbor city boards and commissions]

In January 2011, responding to a question from The Chronicle about his view of the status of the DDA and the board of canvassers as a part of the local government in the context of the LOCC eligibility requirement, city attorney Stephen Postema wrote in an email:  ”…  I would have to research the issue more closely to give a definitive answer.”

Present: Martha Darling, William Lockwood, Roger Hewitt and Eunice Burns.

Next meeting: Sometime in 2013.

In this article, The Chronicle takes a look at some of the recent history of compensation for Ann Arbor’s mayor and city councilmembers. The context for this reflection also stems in part from the fact that 2011, as an odd-numbered year, will be an occasion on which mayor and councilmember salaries are re-evaluated for 2012 and 2013.

As a minor part of his 2010 campaign for a Ward 5 city council seat, Newcombe Clark promised that if elected he would donate to charity the annual councilmember salary of $15,913. At a Main Street Area Association candidate forum, Clark gave this rationale for his promised salary donation: Negotiations with the city’s labor unions would be difficult, if councilmembers were collecting “a single dime” for something they should do on a volunteer basis.

For most Ward 5 voters, Clark’s promise and its premise were not a deciding factor, and Democrat Carsten Hohnke was re-elected on Nov. 2 to a second two-year term with 69% of the vote. The remaining 31% of the vote was split – 22% for Republican John Floyd and 9% for the independent Clark.

Still, based on last year’s city council budget discussions, current city councilmembers recognize that their own compensation is part of the relevant context for any financial sacrifices they might request of others. Last year, a council request for sacrifice came as the city was negotiating with the firefighters union to prevent layoffs, and as the council requested a reduction in non-union staff compensation by 3%. In that context, some councilmembers, including the mayor, announced a voluntary 3% salary giveback of their own. For councilmembers, that meant writing a $477 check, while for the mayor it represented $1,273. [The mayor's salary for 2010 is $42,436.]

So as the city council enters its budget planning phase for fiscal year 2012, compensation levels – for non-union and union labor alike, as well as for elected city officials – could become one focus of the conversation. That’s especially true, given that FY 2012 is the first year of a two-year budget planning cycle. Even though the council approves each year’s budget separately every May – for the fiscal year beginning July 1 – the planning takes place in two-year cycles. And it’s the first year of the planning cycle when the context is set for the second year.

Compensation for councilmembers and the mayor is also set on a two-year cycle, and 2011 will be a calendar year when a decision could be made to change their salaries. The every-odd-year session of the local officers compensation commission (LOCC) – the body that sets council and mayoral salaries – is prescribed by the state enabling statute on which the city’s LOCC ordinance is based.

With the LOCC scheduled to meet sometime in 2011, and with two current vacancies on the seven-member body, it’s a suitable time to reflect on: (1) the history of the LOCC’s recommendations over the last decade; (2) the rationale behind those recommendations; and (3) the way that expectations of the mayor and councilmembers have been implicitly defined through those recommendations.

LOCC Background

The Ann Arbor city charter actually stipulates that city councilmembers receive no compensation at all, and that the compensation for the mayor is determined by the city council:

Compensation of Officers

SECTION 12.6. (a) Each member of the Council, except the Mayor, shall serve without pay. The compensation of the Mayor shall be fixed by the Council. When authorized by the Council, necessary expenses may be allowed to its members when actually incurred on behalf of the City. [Ann Arbor City Charter]

But in 1972, the state legislature amended the Home Rule Cities Act with a law that allowed cities to create local officers compensation commissions to set salaries of local officials. From Section 117.5c of the Michigan Compiled Laws:

In place of a charter provision existing on December 31, 1972 establishing the salaries or the procedure for determining salaries of elected officials, the governing body may establish, by ordinance, the procedure described in this section, in which case the restriction contained in a charter provision with respect to changing salaries during term shall be inapplicable.

So in 1975, the city of Ann Arbor added Chapter 22 to its city code, which established such a commission under the state law, thus overriding the city charter stipulation that Ann Arbor city councilmembers serve without pay.

Following the state enabling legislation, the city’s ordinance section outlines the establishment of a seven-member local officers compensation commission (LOCC) that determines the compensation of the mayor and city councilmembers.

The commission is required to meet every odd-numbered year to determine the salaries of elected officials for the next two years. The last time the LOCC met, in 2009, it recommended salaries for 2010 and 2011. The commission is required to meet at some point in 2011, to recommend salaries for 2012 and 2013.

Another restriction placed on the commission members is how long they can deliberate on their decision. The commission may meet up to 15 times, and it must make a decision within 45 days of its first meeting. The historical pattern over the last 10 years has been for Ann Arbor’s LOCC to meet in the last part of the calendar year, but in 2009 a decision was reached in May.

The decision of the LOCC automatically takes effect unless the city council rejects the decision by a 2/3 majority. No action is required by the city council in order for the LOCC decision to be implemented. It’s thus not possible for councilmembers and the mayor to vote themselves a raise. They can, however, vote to reject a raise or – if the LOCC were to decide a pay cut was appropriate – vote to stave off that pay cut.

Who Serves on the LOCC?

As detailed in the city’s ordinance, based on the state statute:

The members [of the LOCC] shall be registered electors of the city, appointed by the mayor subject to confirmation by a majority of the members elected and serving in the legislative body. … No member or employee of the legislative, judicial or executive branch of any level of government or members of the immediate family of such member or employee shall be eligible to be a member of the commission.

So, members of the LOCC must be registered voters of the city and, like most other city commissions or boards, they are nominated by the mayor and approved by the city council.

Excluded from service on the LOCC are any members or employees of any branch of government at any level – executive, legislative, or judicial – along with the immediate family of such members or employees.

While the language in the statute and the city’s ordinance is fairly broad, there are at least three entities which the city of Ann Arbor does not appear to treat as part of any branch of government in the sense of its ordinance: (1) the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority board; (2) the city’s greenbelt advisory commission (GAC); and (3) the board of canvassers. Roger Hewitt currently serves on Ann Arbor’s DDA as well as the LOCC. Martha Darling currently serves on the city’s LOCC; her husband Gil Omenn serves on the GAC. And finally, William Lockwood serves as a member of the board of canvassers – the body responsible for verifying city election results – as well as the LOCC.

Added shortly after initial publication: In addition, Fred McDonald serves on the LOCC; his son, Kevin McDonald, is employed by the city of Ann Arbor as an assistant city attorney.

City attorney Stephen Postema did not respond to an email asking for comment on the LOCC membership question. The state attorney general’s office indicated to The Chronicle in a phone interview that for this kind of issue, a formal opinion from the state attorney general would be required. In a phone interview, Bill Mathewson, general counsel for the Michigan Municipal League, said that with respect to a downtown development authority, he did not see any immediate legal conflict with service on a LOCC, and observed that DDAs are autonomous entities.

The state statute sets the size of Ann Arbor’s LOCC at seven members – because its population exceeds 20,000 people. Cities with fewer than 20,000 residents can establish five-member LOCCs.

While a full term for a LOCC member is seven years, the recent history of Ann Arbor’s LOCC has included instances of partial terms served. And with one member’s death in 2006 and the expiration of another member’s term, the commission is currently left with two vacancies and five experienced members: Fred McDonald, Martha Darling, Roger Hewitt, William Lockwood, and Eunice Burns.

Fred McDonald is the longest-serving LOCC member, having been appointed in 1999; McDonald co-founded Scroll Capital Partners … McDonald is a partner in the law firm Hamilton McDonald & Carter. His current LOCC term expires in 2014.

Martha Darling has served on the LOCC since 2005. Although she retired from her work at the Boeing Co., she continues to stay involved with community affairs. Darling is vice chair of the board of trustees for the Ann Arbor Area Community Foundation (AAACF), co-chair of Washtenaw Success by 6 and a board member of the Michigan Theater and Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra. Her current term expires in 2012.

Roger Hewitt, who has served since 2003, is proprietor of the Red Hawk Bar & Grill in Ann Arbor. He recently co-founded a coffee shop and specialty grocery market on the ground floor of Zaragon Place: revive + replenish. He’s on the board of the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority and the State Street Area Association. His current term expires in 2014.

William Lockwood is a telecommunications executive and also serves on the board of canvassers for the city of Ann Arbor. Lockwood began serving on the LOCC in 2000 and his current term is set to expire in 2012.

Eunice Burns, a former DDA board member and former Ann Arbor city councilmember, has been serving on the LOCC since 2003 – her current term expires in 2014. Burns also serves as a Huron River Watershed Council liaison for the city of Ann Arbor.

Rachel Tiedke and Michael Schippani had filled the remaining two spots. Tiedke passed away in 2006, and Schippani’s term expired in 2009. Both spots have yet to be filled. Thus, the commission has not had a full complement of seven members since its 2005 meetings.

Here’s an overview of LOCC membership [last name only], based on minutes for LOCC meetings from 1999-2009 and city records of current membership:

1999  Dobson  Eldersveld                     Tiedke  Edwards   Beal
2001  Dobson  Eldersveld  Koen     McDonald  *       Edwards   Beal
2003  Hewitt  Schippani   Koen     McDonald  Tiedke  DeVarti   Burns
2005  Hewitt  Schippani   Darling  McDonald  Tiedke  Lockwood  Burns
2007  Hewitt  Schippani   Darling  McDonald          Lockwood  Burns
2009  Hewitt  Schippani   Darling  McDonald          Lockwood  Burns
2011  Hewitt              Darling  McDonald          Lockwood  Burns

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[* Although Rachel Tiedke was appointed in 1999, her name is not reflected in any of the 2001 meeting minutes.] Full names of members: Stephen Dobson, Roger Hewitt, Sam Eldersveld, Michael Schippani, Michael Koen, Martha Darling, Fred McDonald, Rachel Tiedke, Joseph Edwards, David DeVarti, William Lockwood, Fred Beal, Eunice Burns.

1999-2009 LOCC Decisions, Council Rejections

The table below summarizes the outcome of Ann Arbor’s LOCC deliberations since 1999. The first column is the scheduled year when the LOCC met (every odd-numbered year): LOCC YEAR. When it meets, the commission decides the recommended salaries for the next two years. In the table, those years appear in the second column: SLRY YEAR. The third column contains the salary for the mayor as decided by the LOCC: REC MAYOR. The LOCC decision automatically takes effect unless the LOCC decision is rejected by the city council. So the dollar figure in the fourth column – which contains the actual mayoral salary for the year, labeled ACTL MAYOR – matches the figure in the third column only when the city council took no action to reject the LOCC decision. The final two columns, for city council salaries, are interpreted in the same fashion.

The first row of the table shows that the LOCC met in 1999 to determine the salaries for 2000. Commissioners decided that $18,300 would be the compensation for the mayor and $9,800 for city councilmembers. The city council took no action to reject those decisions and those amounts were thus the actual salaries.

In four out of the last six years when the LOCC has met, the city council has allowed the LOCC decision on mayoral and council salaries to stand. However, in 2001 and 2005 the LOCC decisions were rejected by the council, leaving the actual compensation the same as it had been previously – lower than the LOCC recommendation.

In 2001, the LOCC determined the council salaries for 2002 and 2003 to be $11,950, which would have given councilmembers a $2,150 – or 22% – raise. Rejection of the LOCC decision by the council left their salaries at $9,800. In 2005, it was a smaller raise that council members decided to forgo. The LOCC recommended council salaries of $15,450 for 2006 and $15,913 for 2007. That year the council rejected the LOCC decision to raise their salaries by 3% each year, leaving their compensation at $15,000. The LOCC decisions in 2001 and 2005 on mayoral salary followed a similar pattern.

DECISIONS OF ANN ARBOR LOCC 

LOCC   SLRY   REC       ACTL      REC       ACTL
YEAR   YEAR   MAYOR     MAYOR     COUNCIL   COUNCIL
1999   2000   $18,300   $18,300   $ 9,800   $ 9,800
1999   2001   $18,300   $18,300   $ 9,800   $ 9,800
2001   2002   $22,300   $18,300   $11,950   $ 9,800
2001   2003   $22,300   $18,300   $11,950   $ 9,800
2003   2004   $28,000   $28,000   $12,000   $12,000
2003   2005   $40,000   $40,000   $15,000   $15,000
2005   2006   $41,200   $40,000   $15,450   $15,000
2005   2007   $42,436   $40,000   $15,913   $15,000
2007   2008   $41,200   $41,200   $15,450   $15,450
2007   2009   $42,436   $42,436   $15,913   $15,913
2009   2010   $42,436   $42,436   $15,913   $15,913
2009   2011   $42,436   $42,436   $15,913   $15,913
2011   2012     ??        ??        ??        ??
2011   2013     ??        ??        ??        ??

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Over the last decade, the years when council and mayor salaries rose most significantly were 2004 and 2005, when the mayor’s salary jumped from $18,300 to $28,000 and then to $40,000. Councilmember salaries jumped from $9,800 to $12,000 and then to $15,000. That was the result of a 2003 LOCC decision that set salaries for 2004-05 – a decision that was not rejected by the city council. City council minutes do not reflect a vote on the LOCC decision from 2003 – the council need not vote in order for the LOCC decision to take effect.

The 2007 Council Vote: “Debate Club Theater”

After declining to take any action to reject the 2003 LOCC decision to increase the mayor’s salary by 118% and a councilmember’s salary by 53%, two years later the council did reject smaller, 3% annual increases for 2006 and 2007.

So in 2007, the LOCC delivered the same decision that the council had rejected two years prior – a 3% annual increase for the following two years, 2008 and 2009. The second time around the council didn’t ultimatly reject the decision, but it did vote on a resolution that would have rejected it.

The deliberations unfolded at the Dec. 17, 2007 meeting, when the proposal to reject the LOCC’s decision was separated out into three separate resolutions: one on the mayor, another on the mayor pro tem [which we leave aside here], and a third on councilmembers. The resolution to reject the LOCC decision was introduced by Sabra Briere (Ward 1) and Christopher Easthope, who then was one of two Ward 5 councilmembers. [Briere is still currently on council; Easthope was elected as a 15th District Court judge in 2008.]

The constitution of the city council at that time was: Ronald Suarez (Ward 1), Sabra Briere (Ward 1), Joan Lowenstein (Ward 2), Stephen Rapundalo (Ward 2), Stephen Kunselman (Ward 3), Leigh Greden (Ward 3), Margie Teall (Ward 4), Marcia Higgins (Ward 4), Christopher Easthope (Ward 5), Mike Anglin (Ward 5) and John Hieftje (mayor).

The resolutions on the mayor and councilmember salaries ultimately failed on a voice vote, which allowed the LOCC-determined raise to stand. Commentary in a Dec. 23, 2007 editorial published in the Ann Arbor News read as follows:

Quite a kabuki dance ensued as the resolution was discussed and ultimately defeated – meaning that the pay raises will go into effect. Easthope and new Council Members Sabra Briere, D-1st Ward, and Mike Anglin, D-5th Ward, voted to reject the raises for the council – though Anglin supported giving Mayor John Hieftje a raise. (A challenge by Leigh Greden, D-3rd Ward, was pure debate-club theater. Greden proposed that those rejecting the raises give the money to charity – Easthope, Briere and Anglin all agreed to do it.)

[Editor's note: The editorial was drafted by Ann Arbor Chronicle publisher Mary Morgan, who at the time served as opinion editor for the News.]

Then, in the summer of 2009, a request made by Ann Arbor News columnist Judy McGovern under the Freedom of Information Act yielded emails exchanged between councilmembers during that Dec. 17, 2007 meeting. Those emails revealed the talk at the table to have been scripted out. [In the email exchanges, it's clear that the reference point for "passing" and "voting yes" is the idea of the pay raise, not the resolution that would have rejected the LOCC decision.] From McGovern’s July 21, 2009 article:

7:32 p.m. – Leigh Greden to Marcia Higgins: “SK (Stephen Kunselman) is with us on the pay raise.”
7:34 p.m. – Higgins to Greden: “Welll (sic) that’s 5 of us. Anyone else?”
7:37 p.m. – Greden to Higgins: “Higgins, (Margie) Teall, (Stephen) Rapundalo, (Joan) Lowenstein, Greden, Kunselman. I think (Mayor John) Hieftje is with us too. He wants it to pass. I told him I would publicly challenge anyone who votes no (against accepting the additional compensation) to return the pay raise or donate it to a charity. I told him I would publicly follow-up on that challenge in 6 months, so he better vote yes.”
7:38 p.m. – Higgins to Greden: “Joan changed her mind?”
7:39 p.m. – Greden to Higgins: “She said ‘I just don’t want to be the only one.’ I told her we have a majority, so she said she’d vote with us.”
As the question reached the floor, Greden e-mailed Easthope.
8:28 p.m. – Subject “wait”
“I’m going to see what people say about the pay raise. I will challenge in a minute.”
8:29 p.m. – Easthope to Greden: “Make sure, that’s our deal for keeping my mouth shut. I told John I wouldn’t ask for a roll call vote.”
8:29 p.m. – Greden to Easthope: “Deal. I need to let the others speak first.”

For its part, the LOCC was content that the council had not rejected its recommendation. Writing on behalf of the LOCC in an Ann Arbor News op-ed piece, Martha Darling and William Lockwood said:

We are most pleased that the council has accepted our recommendation for a 3 percent raise in each of the next two years for itself and for the mayor. [Ann Arbor News, Dec. 30, 2007]

2003 LOCC Decision: Rationale

While the actual decision to increase mayoral and councilmember salaries significantly came in 2003, the rationale for the change was also reflected publicly in the 2007 op-ed piece written by Darling and Lockwood and published in The Ann Arbor News [.pdf of complete text of Darling and Lockwood's op-ed]:

… the council hires a professional administrator to run the city government while the citizens elect the mayor to provide public leadership for the entire city. What may have initially begun as a part-time position with significant ceremonial duties has over the years expanded to incorporate opportunities for substantive leadership on a variety of complex issues affecting the city’s quality of life. Among these are environmental stewardship, regional transportation, housing and urban design. That leadership is exercised in a variety of local, state and national forums.

It is arguable that leadership responsibilities at this level require much more than “part-time” attention. In fact, it may not be possible to carry out such responsibilities well and still hold an outside job adequate to pay the bills. …

However, at some point, maybe even now, the high time demands and low salary levels of these [city council] positions may present too high an economic barrier to many individuals interested in serving the community. The need to support a family usually requires a full-time job, often two full-time workers, leaving very little time for community involvement. The residents of Ann Arbor lose when less than everyone is engaged. [Ann Arbor News, Dec. 30, 2007]

Written by former councilmember Mike Reid as a reply to the Lockwood and Darling piece, an op-ed published by the News in early 2008 offered a different view [.pdf of complete text of Reid's op-ed]:

In my view, the logic behind this argument is buttressed by two equally questionable assumptions. First, that higher salary is a necessary requirement to entice qualified individuals into seeking office, and second, that the complexity of the job and the magnitude of the city budget warrants movement towards establishing a professional class of local politicians. I respectfully disagree on both counts. …

We need look no further than our Board of Education, Washtenaw Community College trustees, library board or the University of Michigan Board of Regents to appreciate that individuals from many professional, cultural and economic walks of life willingly step forward in service to the community with little to no compensation. …

Our city charter specifies a strong administrator/weak mayor form of government. This means the city administrator serves as the de facto chief executive while the mayor and council members are charged with three principal responsibilities: 1) hire the city administrator, 2) hire the city attorney, and 3) approve a balanced annual budget. Everything else is optional. [Ann Arbor News, Jan. 18, 2008]

2003 LOCC Decision: Deliberations

What were the actual LOCC deliberations like in 2003? They were marked by appeals from then-current councilmembers for higher salaries. [.pdf of all LOCC meeting minutes and determinations from 1999-2009]

The LOCC met on Dec.18 and 23 of that year to determine mayoral and city council compensation for 2004 and 2005. For 2004, the LOCC recommended an increase in compensation for both mayor and councilmembers that Mike Reid in his subsequent op-ed piece characterized as “massive pay hikes” – the mayoral salary increased to $28,000 from $18,300 and a city council salary rose to $12,000 from $9,800. The recommended amounts were increased even more for 2005 – a mayoral salary of $40,000 and a city council salary of $15,000.

According to the official determination submitted by the LOCC in 2003, the following factors were considered during the deliberations:

• Nature of public service
• History of salary increases for mayor and city councilmembers
• Existing salary information for members of the Washtenaw County board of commissioners
• Average salaries for persons in the State of Michigan serving in similar positions with the same form of government
• Financial sacrifices incurred by elected officials
• Public comment and historical written comments from past and current members of the city council on the nature of their duties and the extensive number of hours per week devoted to city government
• Community expectations

In 2001, the LOCC had already recommended an increase in salaries, though its decision was rejected by the city council. In 2003, Christopher Easthope, then the mayor pro tem, attended a Dec. 18 LOCC meeting, and explained that one chief reason for the 2001 rejection was the “political climate” of the time. From the meeting minutes:

The Commission also inquired as to why Mr. Easthope believed the decision on the 2001 Commission was rejected. Mr. Easthope indicated the political climate at the time was decisive in Council’s decision. He also indicated that he felt the same climate did not currently exist.

At the subsequent Dec. 23, 2003 meeting, no one appeared during public comment to address the LOCC as Easthope had five days before. However, the meeting minutes indicate that councilmember Leigh Greden submitted a written memo. [.pdf of all memos collected by LOCC for 2001-2003]. In the memo, Greden argued for higher mayoral and councilmember salaries:

It is imperative that our elected officials have the experience in finance, law, and/or community development required to lead a city of our size and prestige. Unfortunately, service on City Council demands significant time, which makes it difficult for people with these skills to serve as on Council while maintaining full-time jobs. Indeed, I plan to begin a reduced work schedule beginning January 1, 2003 – which also means a reduced salary so I can devote the time needed to my City Council activities. There is a consensus throughout this community that our elected officials are underpaid.

2003 Decision: Previous Session’s Data

The issue of time commitment from elected officers had been discussed by the LOCC in 2001 when it circulated a two-question survey to several several community leaders. Responses came from Susan J. Greenberg (Democratic Party chair), Marlene A. Chockley (Republican Party chair), as well as then councilmembers Jean Carlberg, Wendy Woods, Heidi Herrell, Marcia Higgins, and Stephen Hartwell. Written comment was also received from Christopher Kolb, who had left the city council the previous month because he’d been elected to serve as the state representative for District 53, and Pat Dixon, whose service on the city council went through November 1999.

The survey questions:

1. Did compensation play a direct or indirect role in your determination to run for office? In continuing in office after elected?
2. How many hours per week do you devote to carrying out the duties of your office? Breakdown if possible.

For the first question, office-holders and former office-holders generally indicated that time was more of a factor than the compensation. [.pdf of all memos collected by LOCC for 2001-2003] Typical was this from Pat Dixon:

One of the reasons I decided not to run for city council [again] was the time. The lack of good compensation was a consideration but their [sic] are higher goals in life. I’m used to financial struggle but it didn’t help that it actually cost me. … I was up every night to two or three in the morning answering email. Physically I began to deteriorate.

Similar sentiments came from Heidi Herrell:

The compensation did not play a role in my decision to run for council the first time. The time involved was underrepresented to me, so I didn’t know what I was getting into! Also, I have found that the longer I have been on council, the more time it takes.

Several of the respondents indicated they felt that the job of mayor of Ann Arbor is a full-time job. Again from Herrell:

Even if the Council members compensation is not increased to market rates, The Mayor’s compensation should be. The Mayor of Ann Arbor is a FULL TIME JOB. It is virtually impossible to have another job at the same time, and $18,300.00 IS NOT ENOUGH TO LIVE ON.

Those who responded to the time breakdown used a variety of different categories. Councilmembers documented a range of time commitments across categories for actual meetings/work sessions, committee meetings, meeting preparation and constituent engagement that averaged between 25-30 hours a week. To illustrate, here’s how Jean Carlberg broke down 32 hours per week:

Council meetings, work sessions,
caucus meetings and preparation: 5 hours/week (minimum)
Boards and committee meetings:  11 hours/week
Community activities:            6 hours/week
Citizen contacts:                4 hours/week
Preparation/Research:            6 hours/week

TOTAL:                          32 hours/week

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In his response to the LOCC, Kolb indicated: “A light week is at least twenty hours, up to 60+ hours the more leadership you put into City Council.”

Some of the data provided to the LOCC dealt not with time commitments, but rather with comparisons to compensation in other municipalities. For example, Heidi Herrell mentions that Livonia’s mayor is paid $89,500. And Leigh Greden’s memo includes the following table, which he contended showed that Ann Arbor’s elected officials are undercompensated – numbers in the righthand column indicate population size:

Warren, MI     $25,999 + benefits (council) 137,672
Livonia, MI    $14,400 (council)            100,545
Westland, MI   $11,796 (council)            l86,602
Southfield, MI $15,600 (council)             77,859
Hamtramck, MI  $12,000 (council)             22,976
Utica, MI      $24,700 (mayor)                4,577

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At that time, Ann Arbor’s mayor was paid $18,300 and councilmembers were paid $9,800 per year.

Council/Mayoral Roles in the Council-Manager Form

It is acknowledged in the minutes of LOCC deliberations over the last decade that Ann Arbor’s local government is a council-manager form. That means the council hires a professionally-trained city administrator to run the city. This contrasts with the strong mayor form, where there is no city administrator, and the city’s operations are instead handled by the mayor. This is a point stressed throughout Kirk Westphal’s film,“The Council-Manager Form of Local Government.”

The $89,500 paid to Livonia’s mayor in 2001 – adduced by Herrell in arguing for a higher salary for Ann Arbor’s mayor – should be understood in the context of Livonia’s strong mayor system. Likewise, the $24,700 paid to Utica’s mayor – adduced by Greden in arguing for a higher mayoral salary – should be understood in the context of Utica’s strong mayor system. In Utica and Livonia, the mayor’s job responsibility includes considerably more than does Ann Arbor’s.

The most obvious difference between the two systems of government – strong mayor versus council-manager – is defined in terms of the existence or absence of a city administrator and the impact that has on mayoral responsibility. But what about the role of city councilmembers in a strong mayor system, compared to a council-manager system?

Three of the five cities used by Greden to argue for higher council salaries are strong-mayor cities: Warren, Livonia and Westland.

Does it make sense to compare councilmember salaries in a strong mayor city with those in a council-manager city, when a local officers compensation commission evaluates appropriate salary levels?

In a council-manager system, the council must supervise the city administrator – a responsibility that is absent in a strong mayor system. From that point of view, the job of a city councilmember in a council-manager form might be seen as more demanding.

On the other hand, in a strong mayor system, the council performs a check on mayoral executive power that it does not perform in a council-manager system. And the importance of that check might be more or less important, depending on the qualifications of the mayor actually managing day-to-day operations of a city. Whereas city administrators are hired by a council precisely for their professionally demonstrated qualifications to run a city, a strong mayor is “hired” by voters for any number of reasons, which might not include an ability to manage a city effectively. That means the work of providing a check could be significant. From that point of view, the job of a city councilmember in a strong mayor system might be seen as more demanding.

In a phone interview with The Chronicle, Joe Ohren – a professor of political science at Eastern Michigan University who’s featured in Westphal’s film – acknowledged the reasonableness of both points of view about the burden of a city councilmember in a strong mayor versus a council-manager form. He added an additional perspective on the role of a city council in today’s world. More now than previously, he said, the role of a city councilmember is expected to be more active is soliciting citizen participation and in helping citizens understand what policy options are available and in making clear what the rationale is for policies that are adopted. “You have to be teachers,” he concluded.

Jered Carr, a professor of public administration and public policy at Wayne State University who’s also featured in Westphal’s film, told The Chronicle that in either form of government, a significant factor in the work load of councilmembers is how much fiscal stress there is. In Michigan, he pointed out, there’s been fiscal stress for quite some time.

Other Factors in Setting Compensation

Historically, consideration of salaries for elected officials by Ann Arbor’s LOCC has been viewed not just in terms of what amount the office of mayor and councilmember deserve to be paid.

Other Factors: Fiscal Impact

Compensation has also been evaluated in terms of fiscal impact. Otherwise put, how much does it cost the community to pay our set of elected officials to do their work? From the 2003 LOCC determination:

Fiscal Impact of 2003 LOCC Determinations

The total cost in increased salary payments will be $150,000 in year 2004 and $193,000 in year 2005. The 2003 LOCC determinations represent .001 of the Ann Arbor City approximate $235,000,000 budget for FY 2003-2004. It will be necessary to appropriate funding for the salary increases. The total salary paid to elected officials of Ann Arbor costs each resident approximately $1.32 in year 2004 and $1.69 in year 2005 per resident per year.

From meeting minutes, it’s not clear if the fiscal impact has been analyzed comparatively across communities by the LOCC. For that comparison, it’s necessary to contemplate how many councilmembers serve on a given city’s council. Whereas Ann Arbor’s city council includes 10 members plus the mayor, three of the city’s on Greden’s list have only seven members on their councils. For Southfield, the $109,200 total cost of the seven-member council in 2003, at $15,600 per member, compared to a total cost of $98,000 for Ann Arbor’s 10-member council that year. That still represents an 11.5% difference, before factoring in Southfield’s somewhat smaller population and budget.

Other Factors: Comparison to Wage Standards

Ann Arbor’s LOCC has also contemplated how local officials’ compensation stacks up against the city’s living wage standard. From the 2001 set of LOCC meeting minutes:

Discussion focused the use of the previous method of calculation, CPI Index-based, versus the use of an established living wage multiplied by a weekly average of hours of service. To further discussion, the living wage method was calculated using an average of 25 hrs of service which resulted in a proposed increase in salaries for the Council Members of $13,500 and $25,200 for the Mayor.

In 2001, the city council enacted a living wage ordinance, which required contractors with the city to pay a living wage to its workers. The initial levels set by the ordinance were $8.70 for contractors who also offered health benefits and $10.20 per hour for those who do not.

The CPI escalator used by the city to increase its living wage has now increased the hourly rate to $13.06 for employers not offering health care benefits. [City councilmembers and the mayor do not receive health care benefits. But the council itself has the power to enact benefits for itself, based on a 1978 state attorney general Opinion No. 5255.]

If a living wage rate is assumed, then at current salary levels, councilmembers are expected to work 15,913/13.06/52 = 23 hours per week. And assuming the living wage rate, the mayoral salary would translate into 42,436/13.06/52 = 62.5 hours per week.

Using the current federal minimum wage of $7.25/hour, a councilmember earns a bit more than a minimum-wage worker who puts in 40 hours a week. [7.25*40*52 = $15,080 compared to a councilmember's $15,903]

Options Besides Adjusting Compensation

The only issue in the purview of a local officers compensation commission is the setting of salary. It is not up to the commission to redefine the responsibilities of the council and mayor. So partly in response to the volume of work that councilmembers reported doing in the early 2000s, Ann Arbor’s LOCC adjusted salaries upward. The definition of the job of councilmember and mayor in Ann Arbor did not change with the salary adjustment, but the salary increase could be seen as confirmation that the amount of time being spent by the mayor and councilmembers was appropriate to the actual job definition.

In the early 2000s, mayor John Logie of Grand Rapids took a slightly different approach. He was putting a large amount of time into the part-time job of mayor, which was then paid $35,000. He argued that the job of mayor should be made full-time. The Calvin College newspaper “Chimes” reported it this way:

Logie, an attorney at Warner, Norcross and Judd law firm when not acting as Grand Rapids’ Mayor at City Hall, is concerned that people may vie for the $35,000-a-year part-time position because (1) it’s more money than they have been making, or, at the other end (2) they are independently wealthy, at or near retirement age and living off a pension. [Chimes, Feb. 15, 2002]

Any increase in salary for a full-time position, however, was implicit. Logie’s actual proposal was not to increase the salary, but rather to equip the mayor’s position with more power, including a power to veto a vote of the council, plus the power to hire the city manager, the city attorney, the clerk, and the treasurer.

It would have created a kind of hybrid council-manager/strong mayor system. Ann Arbor already has somewhat of a hybrid system, because the mayor enjoys a power of veto, though the current mayor, John Hieftje, has never used it in more than a decade of service. Ann Arbor’s clerk and treasurer are hired by the city administrator. The Ann Arbor city council hires the city attorney and the city administrator.

To change mayoral responsibility would require a charter amendment, which requires the matter to be put before the voters.

Later in 2002, Logie announced that he would not stand for re-election the following year, to help convince councilmembers to place the full-time mayor proposal on the ballot, and to ensure that voters were not deciding the question of whether he personally should become a full-time mayor. Grand Rapids voters wound up rejecting the proposal to change the city charter to redefine mayoral responsibility, and George Heartwell was elected mayor.

Looking Ahead

Sometime during 2011 it’s likely that the two vacancies on Ann Arbor’s local officers compensation commission will be filled. And when the year’s session schedule is announced, The Chronicle will add the LOCC’s sessions to its meeting coverage.

About the writers: Dave Askins is editor and co-founder of The Ann Arbor Chronicle. Hayley Byrnes is a Chronicle intern.