To the editor:
For decades, the Onondaga County Legislature has struggled with how to address elected officials’ salaries. Many times I have opposed raises for elected officials. For the past year, proposals to increase elected officials’ salaries were debated. I have always said it would take an important change to the process for me to support an increase to an elected official’s salary. At our recent legislative session, an opportunity presented itself to completely remove the county legislators from the process of setting salaries and instead tie any future increases to a Consumer Price Index (CPI).
Each year the federal government determines whether or not Social Security benefits will increase based on a Consumer Price Index. I truly felt that if benefits for seniors are determined by a CPI, then this is the best way to remove politics from establishing salary schedules for elected officials. Moving forward, if the CPI does not increase, salaries for the county executive, county comptroller, county clerk, county sheriff and county legislators will not increase. Very few municipalities across New York state have adopted a policy that ties raises to federal cost-of-living adjustments. This was the driving factor in voting “yes.” The legislature has delivered balanced budgets with property tax decreases for six consecutive years. In that time, the legislature has not received a raise, and the increase we will receive, 15 percent, is less than the percentage increase CSEA received from 2008-12 (15.25 percent). There is a proposal before CSEA membership that will provide them with an increase of 12 percent for 2013-2018.
I had an opportunity to take pay raises for elected officials out of the hands of politicians and into the hands of the economy. I feel it was the right thing to do.
JUDY TASSONE
County Legislator
Fourth District
