After no raises for councillors in more than 10 years, Bowden council is turning to the public to determine if a bump is needed in the remuneration rates for councillors and the mayor.
At its Sept. 23 meeting, council passed a motion calling on town staff to form a “citizens-at-large committee” to research if council remuneration is adequate and then make a recommendation on whether to maintain or increase council's financial compensation.
Excluding per diems, meal expenses and mileage, Bowden councillors receive $250 a month.
That rate has been in place since at least 2002.
The mayor's monthly remuneration is $500 and that rate has been in place since 2006 when it was increased from $425.
Coun. Sheila Church, who had planned on stepping away from council after this year's municipal election but was acclaimed to another term on Sept. 23 due to a lack of candidates, had put the remuneration issue on the agenda for the Sept. 23 meeting because it is customary in Bowden for the outgoing council to look into potential remuneration changes for the incoming council.
She said she felt the amount council receives as a monthly stipend discourages some members of the public “who would be good candidates” from running for council.
“For example, if there was a mother who was home with her children, probably well-educated, able to contribute something, the amount we get doesn't even pay her babysitter. And so she'd think, well why would I bother doing this?” Church said, pointing to the lack of Bowden candidates in the 2013 municipal election—every seat was acclaimed—as evidence.
“For the amount of expertise and work that is required if you're going to do the job conscientiously, it's very demeaning, the amount that we're paid.”
Mayor Robb Stuart agreed that council's remuneration should be increased but added finding the money to give raises will be tricky.
“I'm the same as everybody else. I think I should get more money, but I really don't want to charge the town more because where are we going to get the money to pay?”
Stuart put forth the idea of a volunteer committee to look at the remuneration issue but Coun. Earl Wilson, a former Bowden councillor who was also acclaimed on Sept. 23, was skeptical of such an idea.
“We're going to go and ask somebody about remuneration who didn't even put his name in to run for council?” he said.
Wilson also questioned why only the mayor and not all of council received a remuneration bump seven years ago.
Andy Weiss, the town's chief administrative officer, said the mayor serving at the time was not part of the remuneration discussions in 2005 and the change was made then for the same reasons council wants to look at a raise this year, a lack of political participation due to the financial viability of taking on a council member's responsibilities.
He added many people interested in running for council this year did ask him prior to nomination day about council's remuneration rates.
“And those phone calls have obviously stopped people from going further.”
Weiss agreed with the idea of putting a committee together to determine if council's compensation is appropriate since the optics of council giving itself a raise is problematic.
Coun. Wayne Milaney praised Weiss and town staff for balancing the town's books, pointing out that the 2013 budget was $2.2 million.
“Having said that, I think there's a little bit of room to manipulate councillors' and the mayor's per diem,” he said. “The people sitting around this table, the board of governors of this corporation, and you're paying them a couple of bucks a month to run your corporation? There's something wrong with that picture.”
The Sept. 23 meeting was the first sitting of Bowden's new council, which was sworn in at the start of the session.
Wilson and Lloyd Lane, who both previously served on council prior to the 2010 election, along with Paul Webb, a former Sundre councillor now living in Bowden, replaced Patrick Doll and Cory Jasper, who did not wish to run for their seats again, and Steve Blamire, who left council last year.
Weiss, as Bowden's returning officer, said the new council could be sworn in prior to the election on Oct. 21 under Section 34-1 of the Local Authorities Election Act which states, “When at the close of nominations the number of persons nominated for any office is the same as the number required to be elected, the returning officer shall declare the persons nominated to be elected to the offices for which they were nominated.”
After making sure all of the new councillors' nomination documents were valid, Weiss said he declared council to be elected.
“As such, as duly elected municipal officials they were eligible to attend and participate in that meeting after being sworn in.”
