Everyone knows that inflation is a problem these days and that is also true when it comes to how much county citizens have to pay their commissioners to serve them.
On Thursday, June 17, the Guilford County Board of Commissioners voted to raise their own salaries by nearly 50 percent. The move came with no discussion and no comment and was included in some final changes to the county manager’s recommended budget before it was adopted Thursday night.
Starting on July 1, the chair, vice-chair and regular commissioners will get $10,000 a year more than they were previously getting. The chair will now get $34,800 a year for doing the people’s business. The vice-chair will get $32,400 and the other commissioners will each get $31,200 annually.
The move is included in the new county budget, which was adopted unanimously by the board Thursday night.
The board has discussed a great many budget items over the last three months leading to the new $600 million-plus budget. However, the Rhino Times never heard this item mentioned once in those workshops and meetings.
After the budget was adopted on June 17, Chairman of the Board of Commissioners Skip Alston said that it was a change suggested by Guilford County Manager Mike Halford since the commissioners were out of line with what other commissioners throughout the state are being paid.
The official language of the item is “Budget Ordinance change based on analysis of positions not reviewed in class and compensation study.”
In recent years, the county has been studying the salaries of the county’s positions to see how much employees are paid compared to employees elsewhere. Anyone familiar with those studies knows that, at least in the case of Greensboro and Guilford County, the studies always say that employees are due a raise. The Rhino Times has never seen a study survey from a consulting firm that has concluded that any government employee is overpaid, and the Rhino doubts that in the history of government salary studies that that has ever happened anywhere.
Skip Alston and the comissioners that voted for this are giving the taxpayer what they voted for…..runaway spending, zero discussion, and personal gain for those that play ball with Skip. For shame.
Honestly…is anybody surprised?
Nope. The Left now controls Guilford County.
MO’ MONEY FO’ DA PUBLIC SECTOR..!
Being a County Commissioner should be a voluntary task with small allowances for postage, telephone use, travel, etc. That would eliminate a lot of problems and headaches. These turds just put the morale of thousands of county employees further into the crapper.
At least The Rhino is being honest about their bias this time. Love the condescending “anyone familiar… knows…”
Some lingering questions that a journalist probably would have included:
When was the last pay raise?
What does that come to hourly?
What do similar roles in neighboring cities or similar size cities in NC get paid?
What studies have “The Rhino” seen? How many? What municipalities? Who were the researchers?
Journalists have an opportunity to educate readers beyond a singular decision at a meeting. This article would have been much improved if it read as follows:
“City council voted to increase their salary by $10,000. The Rhino is yet to do sufficient research or interviews to understand this decision. The Rhino thinks that all research, ever, says government employees are underpaid.” Scott could have saved himself an hour and increased his own pay rate.
Since it was the Guilford County Board of Commissioners who voted to give themselves about a 50 percent raise, I don’t think I’ll use your lead. What other cities pay their councilmembers is irrelevant because Guilford County is not a municipality. City and county governments are remarkably different.
Thank you for not disputing that The Rhino has not done sufficient research or interviews to understand the decision.
I apologize for my mistake. City/county… just a mistake that you pointed out. You can use the new version:
“The Guilford County Board of Commissioners voted to increase their salary by $10,000. The Rhino is yet to do sufficient research or interviews to understand this decision. The Rhino thinks that all research, ever, says government employees are underpaid.”
For clarity – did Elaine or Scott write this? I would think Scott chooses the lede for the articles he writes. And your amateurism shines when you call it a lead! Thanks for the excellent clarification of the quality of this biased publication!
My Version….You have got to be related to someone on the counsel to be so agreeable with this.
Well,if you think the RT is biased,start your own publication.I’ll read it.You could take an ad out in RT so we will know when we can bask in your journalistic sunshine.
At least you have the grace to apologise for being mistaken. Conflating the city of Greensboro and Guilford County is a rookie mistake.
And it’s irrelevant what other NC counties pay their commissioners. The Parasitic Sector always tries to use to most lavish remuneration they can find as a pretext to increase their own remuneration. It’s a race to the top on salaries…but a race to the bottom in competence.
By the way, what part of the Parasitic Sector do you work in?
I know you’re not in the Productive Sector. Right?
Shove Your Version.
Thanks Elaine! Most of us read the Rhino Times because we frankly don’t give a damn about those questions in relation to this specific type of article, if we wanted spin, we’d watch CNN or WFMY, or even worse read the Greensboro News & Toilet Paper.
We rather enjoy this biased publication. Thank you for your equally biased opinion. Strange how it sounds differently? Please understand that we don’t hate Libtards, we detest your point of view. We don’t care what race you are, we despise your policies. We don’t care what gender you are we loathe your “leaders.” Hell, look at POTUS, the poor fellow can’t put more than two words together with the help of a teleprompter, notes in hand, and three handlers mouthing the words from across the room. It would be comical if it weren’t real.
The last raise for Commissioners was in 2005. Guilford County was behind Cumberland County, Buncombe County, New Hanover County, Forsyth County, Mecklenburg County, Durham County, and Wake County.
The commissioners are elected officials. If they don’t like the salary, then don’t run.
Love it when liberals try to explain what fair and accurate journalism should look like! #Hypocrisy
Yes. When was the last pay raise? We appreciate their time with our concerns. We also see a lot of time and work for year ahead and invest time and expertise in how the federal money will best serve the people… note… serve the people and our community…
I will bet they did not consider putting anything in the coffer in order to provide a pay raise for local governmental retirees who haven’t had an adjustment in their pension in several years. This has been overlooked by cities and counties across the state for a long time.
Amen, Brother!
Some of you pensioners are worse whiners than the welfare queens. There was a formula used to calculate your monthy pension which included a figure called Average FINAL Compensation. If we keep upping your pension, there won’t be any monies to fund those of us following along behind you. Most of us have worked through many years without raises to finally see some 2.5%-3% increases while your generation enjoyed 7% annual raises. Please buy a towel or bucket for your tears. We ain’t buying it.
Thanks Elaine for your response to pay raises for commissioners ,I am real glad that we have a great group of journalists in Greensboro that will publish pertinent info about various frying town that are doing underhanded things that come to light only after the fact .Do you think His Highness Skip would have broken this tidbit of info to the people before it happens,WELL NO !!!!! Why wouldn’t the County Mgr have related that information to the people of the County. Everyone knew this is one of the underhanded features of the Democrats.We put it into a budget and no way to change it.We are all suckers for what this curreybiard of Democrats do to a city/county.All Skip Austin is is a career politician.He is one of founders of the failed Museum that is an abject waste.It’s time for someone to look at the chicanery that he has been pulling over Guilford County and their people.He has been on this board forever !!!!! Is there no-one in Greensboro who would run against him to make him retire and Just Go Away.
Who got 7 percent raises? I sure didn’t. And COLA stands for cost of living adjustment which most State and Fed pensions give. And I don’t think asking for a 1 percent increase after 13 years would be classified as whining. Good news is, one day you’ll be in the same boat!
Wow John Q! That hurts.
Amen to that! Amazing they get a 50 percent increase when local government retirees have not had a 1 percent COLA in over thirteen years. City and County officials should be ashamed of themselves for neglecting their former employees in this manner. It would be great if a “journalist” would do a story on that.
This is about $8,000 more than Meklenburg county commissioners are paid. It’s not meant to be a full time job…
Notice to voters: Since we the County residents are paying the salary of the Commissioners and we also elect them, now would be a great time to start taking serious stock of the decisions they make. Before electing or in some cases, reelecting them.
Government officials should do the job without pay. They are to serve us, the people. In reality they serve themselves and their political party. All government is just legalized Mafia.
Well mercy…all these long years I’ve didn’t know I was doing my pay scale wrong. I sure didn’t know all I had to do is give myself a 50% raise. Thanks for the info.
They are in the mind set that this is a job, not a civic duty. When this same bunch of citizens voted by themselves to get a increase and double their time served in office between elections, I knew this was not far behind. I will do all I can to replace each one of them at election time.
The article is right on. I agree with everyone about everything.
Another point; I read today that as of the end of May, the annualized inflation rate is now 9.7%. We know it is even more. Do you have any idea of how quickly your fixed income will be rendered essentially worthless? The lower and middle classes will soon be wiped out, and depending on BB for everything. You will have be rich or well-placed (a Kommisar) to survive. Thus the govt gravy train.
We visited one of our favorite restaurants. New menus. The Greek salad was $17.95. We left. Another restaurant still had their catfish at the same price – if you could find it on the plate – we won’t be back.
Make plans
At 9.7% compounded, your purchasing power will be cut in half in 8-9 years. It follows that you would have have to triple your pre-tax income just to stay even. Or double it if you pay no tax. Hold on to that thought.
County commissioners now get paid the same starting salary as GPD… Ain’t that something…
Greensboro and Guilford County voters will always get they deserve. Until they start making better decisions at the ballot box, they shouldn’t expect anything different.
Exactly. The voter is responsible for what they get. We could have a Libertarian govt, if we nominate and elect Libertarians – and boot them out when they are corrupted (one term).
“Reparations and righteous indignation”
They had no problem voting in a raise for themselves but what about our Firefighters, EMS, police. There was a study done on EMS workers and it did show that they are underpaid but did they get the raise, NO! These are people that are saving lives. No wonder EMS workers are leaving and going elsewhere, they can’t afford to live on Guilford County Salary. Guilford County is short on Firefighters, EMS and police.