OLYMPIA – A Washington citizen panel has approved sizable pay raises for state lawmakers, judges, Gov. Chris Gregoire and other elected officials.
The first-term governor is in line for a $16,000 pay hike over the next two years. Her annual pay, now about $151,000, will rise to $167,000 in September 2008. Other statewide elected officials will get similar generous treatment – raises ranging from nearly 10 percent to more than 12 percent over the next two years.
Lawmakers will go from about $36,000 currently to more than $42,000 in two steps, and the speaker of the House and Senate majority leader will top $50,000 a year.
The citizen Legislature is part time, with experts estimating a 70 percent work schedule. Lawmakers also receive health benefits, $90-a-day tax-free expense money on official workdays, pensions and other perks.
Compensation for judges will rise to between $141,708 and $164,230, depending on the level of the court.
The Washington Citizens’ Commission on Salaries for Elected Officials was created by voters by constitutional amendment in 1986 to remove the hot-potato issue from the hands of the Legislature and governor.
The 16-member panel includes a majority chosen at random by the secretary of state from voter lists to represent the nine congressional districts. The other seven members come from academia, business, law, organized labor and other sectors.
The commission meets once every two years to set salaries, using consultants’ studies, discussing the changing duties and responsibilities of each office and other factors.
The agencies absorb the increases through their budgets, in this case roughly $8 million.
The latest raises, approved Tuesday, were among the largest in the panel’s 20-year history, coming during a boomtime with low unemployment and large budget surpluses.
The raises will be filed with the secretary of state by July 1 and will take effect automatically 90 days later, without going to the Legislature or governor.
Only a citizen referendum could halt the increases. That has never happened since the commission was created.
Most of the raises were adopted unanimously at a public meeting at SeaTac, said Vice Chairman Alan Doman, a retired banker who lives in the Edmonds area.
“There wasn’t a lot of contention,” he said. “There had been a lot of discussion in the months before now and there was a comfort level.
“I expect there will be some concern and criticism, but if we are going to catch up these salaries, then given the economy and our revenue forecast, this is the right time to do it.”
Doman said the commission drew mixed reaction to its salary proposals, with some public hearings and e-mail and telephone messages generating support for increases and some critics also weighing in.
Chief Justice Gerry Alexander of the state Supreme Court praised the commission’s decision to boost judicial salaries. He noted that he’s in the final years of his own career, but said he worries about a “brain drain” from state courts by jurists who take federal appointments or do “private judging” with mediation firms.
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