It’s official ! Remuneration for Cariboo Regional District Directors will go from $12,900 a year to $28,900.
CRD Chair Margo Wagner says they voted to increase their compensation at the last Board meeting in Williams Lake.
” I appreciate that it’s a huge amount but we haven’t had an increase in 20 years. It has come to the Board but it’s been shelved every time. We were the lowest paid Regional District Directors in the province by far. Now with this increase we will be in the middle of the road.”
Wagner says she did have some people ask if they could phase the increase in over time.
“I got a couple of people say is there any way we could do it over 4 years with 25 percent each year. The issue with that is that other regional districts are reassessing their remuneration every 2 or 4 years, so by the time we get to the 4 years we’re still behind the 8 ball.”
Wagner says they are committed, within the new bylaw, to review it every four years moving forward so they don’t end up in this position ever again.
She says one of the main reasons that the increase was needed was to try and attract some younger people to the job.
“Right now the way the pay was is catering to older people who are retired and either have a good pension or who can afford to do the work without getting sufficiently remunerated. People who were working, young people who are maybe at home moms let’s say in their 30’s that are interested in getting into local government, what we get paid won’t even cover the babysitting costs.”
Wagner says the way one of the staff members put it was “Serving in a democracy and an elected office must be universally accessible to everyone for our democracy to work.”
She says the increase won’t impact this year’s budget but it will next year.
Wagner says the impact on residential property owners will be roughly $2.24 per 100 thousand dollars worth of assessed value.