When you get to the state levels, salaries start to seem less superhuman. But at the local level, salaries are still absymally low. In Chattanooga, for instance, city council members get paid about $10K per year. This is supposed to be part time but it never is.
Perception problems
Since most city councils in Georgia serve four-year terms, a double-digit percentage increase once a term can be perceived as larger than if smaller raises were awarded annually.
County commissions and other elected bodies can, by law, sidestep the political baggage by letting the Legislature set their raises once a year, although that can be a gamble.
Cobb County now goes a step further by budgeting raises for county commissioners at the same percentage increase that all other county employees get -- 4 percent this year. Then it gets the Legislature's blessing.
"For the last several years we pegged it to other employees," Commission Chairman Sam Olens said. "I think that's what limits the excesses. It's a lot easier to have raises annually."
When officials go 10 years without a raise and then give themselves a big increase, people notice, Olens said.
That may account for the flurry of requests for pay raises at the Legislature this year -- and for their failure.
After 20 years without a pay increase, the DeKalb school board asked its legislative delegation to more than double member salaries from $12,000 to $25,000.
The delegation settled on $18,000, a 50 percent raise. But Sen. John Wiles (R-Kennesaw) held the measure in the State and Local Government Committee, which he chairs.
Wiles also killed the raises for the Marietta school board when he refused to go along with fellow Cobb Sen. Steve Thompson's local legislation.
"I thought a 100 percent pay raise too much at a time we give teachers 2 percent," Wiles said.
The DeKalb proposal came to his committee late, Wiles said, and he was busy with other legislation. Moreover, it was controversial and the local delegation was divided on the measure, he said.
Atlanta City Councilwoman Debra Starnes is concerned that the nature of part-time public servants is being redefined by increasing salaries.
"I'm gravely concerned about the direction the council is headed," said Starnes, who is not going to run again and voted against the pay raise. "I'm concerned about people seeing it as a livelihood instead of a public service. People are settling in for the long term, and that makes them concerned about the pay."
Starnes also sees the quality of candidates for public office declining. For some, the pay for serving as a part-time elected official is more than they could earn in private industry. "I see it as a trend in elected governing bodies."
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