Central Mass Reps Silent on House Staff Raises
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
A Step Up for Staffers
The three percent cost-of-living adjustment will apply housewide. According to Seth Gitell, a spokesman for DeLeo, there are currently 460 full-time employees in the House, compared to 546 in January of 2009.
"There has not been an increase in over four years for any of these employees," he said. "The House account can fully bear this increase no additional funds are going to be needed."
The bulk those of House employees make between $34,000 and $42,000 claims the House leadership. The increases amount to a total of $764,000, or 2.16 percent of the overall House budget. Even after these compensation adjustments, the House payroll will be almost 10 percent less than it was in February of 2009, said Gitell.
Senate President Therese Murray also doled out 3 percent raises to her staff, however, those raises did not extend to other state Senate offices.
Fiscal Realities
State Senator Michael Moore's budget has not increased in four years, and no increase is expected for next year's budget either. Spokesman Keith Mitchell said the state Senate offices may change salaries within their own budget structure, but there will not be any additional funds made available for their use.
After four years as a State Senator, Mitchell said Moore understands the fiscal reality of serving 172,000 constituents in a still struggling economy.
"He's working with a bare bones staff," said Mitchell. Moore's office currently employs four full-time staff members and two part-time staff members.
Calls to several Worcester area State Representatives regarding the raises for House staffers were not returned by press time.
News of the House staffer raises became public this week, fresh on the heels of reports that state revenues were trailing projections, which has already put the breaks on an automatic income tax reduction set to kick in on January 1 and prompted administration officials to begin freezing hiring and telling agencies to scale back their budgets for this year and build cutbacks into the budgets they are currently working on for the 2014 fiscal year.
Overall, preliminary revenue collections for October 2012 totaled $1.4 billion, down $48 million or 3.3 percent below what the state took in last October. Due to weak performance in most revenue categories and higher than expected income and corporate tax refunds, October collections were $162 million below the monthly benchmark based on the FY13 revenue estimate of $22 billion.
"A Matter of Priorities"
The timing of the raises seemed anything but coincidental to taxpayer advocates.
"My first thought is 'Gee, why didn't they do this before the election?'" said Barbara Anderson, executive director of Citizens for Limited Taxation.
"Clearly they're getting raises now that the voters have told them that anything they do is fine with them."
Anderson said taxpayers are in a dangerous place in relation to the legislature, having seemingly lost the leverage to influence spending decisions on Beacon Hill when the state's finances remain in such dire straits.
She argued that there are plenty of other underfunded projects and priorities in the Commonwealth that could use the money more than House staffers.
However, with the $764,000 only providing an additional $1,660 per year if distributed evenly among the 460 staffers, the 3 percent raises don't amount to all that much on an individual level, but with some staff receiving salaries as low as $19,000 per year, every dollar helps, especially after four years without any raises.
"You have to make this decision every time. What is more important to you? It's a matter of priorities," Anderson said.
"I don't care what they do with it as long as they don't come back looking for more."
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