The City Council Monday night will begin the process to review and approve updated annual salary ranges of officers and unaffiliated employees tied to the percentage increases of the Bridgeport City Supervisors Association.
Roughly 170 city employees, some of them mayoral discretionary appointees, come under this ordinance provision. The current supervisors contract calls for three percent annual wage increases through July 1, 2026.
The mayor is authorized to set salaries within the ranges approved by the City Council. For example, salary spreads for chief of staff, chief administrative officer and city attorney all run $159,135 – $175,049.
The mayor’s salary for this current fiscal year was set at 161,018, according to the budget approved by the City Council. He will receive three percent above his current pay. The mayor’s salary under the proposed pay submitted to the council from Labor Relations reflects $195,206, but that amount will not kick in until 2026 because state law prevents any elected official with a four-year term to receive a pay increase outside of what was established when he took office for the first two years.
Ganim, who runs Connecticut’s most populous city, lags behind the salaries of many chief executives around the state.
State statute:
Section 2 of article eleventh of the Constitution is amended to read as follows: Except as provided in this section, neither the state nor any political subdivision of the state shall pay or grant to any elected official of the state or any political subdivision of the state, any compensation greater than the amount of compensation set at the beginning of such official’s term of office for the office which such official holds or increase the pay or compensation of any public contractor above the amount specified in the contract. The provisions of this section shall not apply to elected officials in towns in which the legislative body is the town meeting. The compensation of an elected official of a political subdivision of the state whose term of office is four years or more may be increased once after such official has completed two years of his term by the legislative body of such political subdivision. The term “compensation” means, with respect to an elected official, such official’s salary, exclusive of reimbursement for necessary expenses or any other benefit to which his office would entitle him.
See full council agenda and back up info here
Letter below from Jun 11, 2024 specifies the percentage increases of the supervisors association through July 1, 2026.
See a selection of salary ranges below
My comments last evening continue the line of questioning about important, unfinished business, in issues of self-governance. Citizens are not regarded as important to the processes of Boards and Commissions. Nowhere in the City are conversations held, informally for folks to listen to each other, become familiar with Council members, and ask questions that, without answers, sow distrust of governance and participation in voting. Non-voting, as such, is worse that non-informed voting. Your voice is lost.
CC Comments December 2, 2024
Good evening, Council members. It’s the time of year for many of us to make lists of parties to attend, people to greet, gifts to purchase in addition to all of the regular obligations to family, of personal regard, and of public governance. Perhaps you will encounter lists with incomplete tasks, made during 2024 of “TO DO” notes to yourself to initiate a list for 2025.
Would you find any notes on oversight, such as I have raised during 2024? Do they reflect on current boards and commission failing regular full appointments? Did the majority of City officials ignore signing in to the Town Clerk office with a residence address per the Council Ordinance created about eight years ago? Will you find a way to appoint a Charter Review Committee which has lagged for some time?
Oversight can be time consuming, but it is also a necessary step to see that laws and ordinances are working. In that regard, CC rules that routinely deny public input at your Committee Meetings is a rebuff or an insult to citizens who wish to become informed about any subject on a Committee Meeting agenda. Why deny the public who attend such meetings a limited right to speak or ask questions that might reveal something you had not considered? Perhaps it is time to review your rules!
How do you regard the City governance on housing, education, or civic engagement within the City? The final financial toll at Success Village Apartments is yet to be discovered but it has already been a significant expense to the City, WPCA, and utility firms that are due payments for over two years. The Receiver appointed to take charge and remedy the situations initially uncovered when he investigated, has likely done a respectable job of getting heat and hot water production for residents.
But where is the City Council with seeing that legislation for a Fair Housing Commission becomes a reality? Such a group has the ability to be an alternative place for unit owners to make known the problems, issues, and concerns that likely lessen their toll of extra expenses, especially for legal matters. Is Bridgeport ‘status quo’ forward looking or serving the public in any meaningful way? I think not, but time will tell.