Burlingame to raise council pay

Rather than tying future salary increases to the Consumer Price Index, Mayor Donna Colson suggested indexing it to the city’s collective bargaining agreement with the union representing Burlingame employees.

“I think it’s just fair,” she said.

Now-former Vice Mayor Emily Beach introduced the topic at her last City Council meeting on July 1 and encouraged fellow councilmembers to emulate the pay increase.

“I think it’s fair for the complexity and the time demand,” she said. “It does provide an opportunity for people — it’s not a full-time job, but it’s a job that could be compelling as a reasonable part-time job.”

A wage increase could open the door for more people to sit on City Council and help alleviate financial concerns that stop residents from running, Beach said, citing her personal experience with the high cost of nighttime child-care while attending council meetings.

“Leaving home at five for a study session, getting here, then leaving at 10 p.m. — that’s $100 dollars of child care, in today’s dollars, for a cheap babysitter,” she said. “It’s real.”

The City Council’s salary was last set in 1999, when the buying power of $590 was more than $1,100 in today’s economy, Beach said.

Raising the council salary is a “mark of respect” to continue to pay those serving what they received 25 years ago, Brownrigg said, acknowledging the potentially negative optics of the council increasing their own wages.

“The politically virtue signaling thing to do is probably to say, ‘oh no,’” he said. “And probably for nobody up on this stage is that extra $450 a month going to really move a needle.”

Councilmembers who don’t want the increase could donate it to a local charity of their choice, Colson suggested.

The City Council will vote on an official ordinance at an upcoming meeting.