Confusion has reigned over a proposal to give Trenton's City Council, including the mayor and key staff members, salary increases.
Confusion seems to abound at City Hall in Trenton. Last month, the administration of Mayor Eric Jackson sent City Council a salary ordinance that seemed to call for generous pay hikes of 15-percent or better over three years for the mayor and his top aides as well as municipal judges and department chiefs.
The ordinance was given preliminary approval by the council on Aug. 18.
Then, on Sept. 2, the mayor announced that the original proposal was in error and that the cost of living increases were a much more modest 1.5-percent each year.
Council members also are slated to receive salary bumps.
One has to wonder why it took two weeks for the mayor to correct the initial salary increases. And one has to wonder why there was no outcry from council about the proposed 15-percent pay hikes at a time when it's unheard of to dole out double-digit cost-of-living adjustments.
Momentum building against proposed pay raises
If the confusion arose from merely misplacing a decimal point from 15-percent to 1.5-percent, that would indicate that City Hall is severely challenged in its math skills, causing an error that would have been very costly to taxpayers.
As the legislative arm of city government, the City Council should serve as a watchdog over the administration. But council members, who were looking to give themselves a tidy 12.5-percent pay hike (from $20,000 to $22,500 annually) retroactive to Jan. 1, may not have been inclined to do much squawking or do their due diligence.
Not so for a group of concerned city residents who were outraged by the proposed salary jump as soon as it was proposed and started a petition drive against it.
"We believe a 15-percent raise is not appropriate for officials who, over the last two years, have made decisions and taken actions that have cost the city millions of dollars," city blogger Kevin Moriarty wrote on a Change.org petition.
Shortly after the outcry from city residents, Jackson went to the press to clarify that the proposed pay hike for him and his lieutenants was more like 1.5 percent annually and that subsequent 1.5 percent increases for the following two years would have to be approved each year.
"Let me be clear, no way in heck would I ever, or did I intend, for my staff to ever suggest ... that the administration, inclusive of the mayor, would receive 15-percent increases," Jackson said during a meeting with NJ Advance Media.
In the end, it was a major embarrassment for the Jackson administration. At least he was gracious enough to admit a mistake was made.
"I'm not a perfect mayor, we're not a perfect administration," Jackson said. "But ... I didn't inherit a perfect city so we're working together through imperfection to make the city as best as we can."
Obviously the mayor, his administration and the City Council are not perfect, as this blunder illustrates.
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