The pay structure for Weyburn City Council will be changing in the new year after they voted to accept a recommendation presented by Nicole Spagrud during last night’s meeting. The new structure will see the pay of the City Council be tied to the wages of MLAs, similar to some other cities of similar size. With the current wages of an MLA in Saskatchewan at $109,576, this would make the salary for the mayor $57,527.40, and for city councillors $21,095.30 starting on January 1st.
The salary for the city council in 2022, the last year the public accounts were published, was $62,989.62 for the mayor, and $21,611.98 for councillors. The salary was also scheduled to increase each year based on the consumer price index. Now, the increases would be capped at three percent per year, as this is currently the largest increase possible for an MLA to receive.
“By taking the responsibility off of whoever is sitting in these chairs when it comes time to make it, we’ll make it more fair and equitable,” said Councillor Ryan Janke. He, along with the majority of the council, agreed that tying the wages to the MLAs' salaries removes discussions and debates by the council on voting for how much money they should make.
“The last thing we ever want to hear is someone say, I would love to run for council, but I can’t afford to pay a babysitter during meetings, or I can’t afford to take that much time off work, so we need to make sure the remuneration is enough to compensate that because our philosophy here is a community for all, and if we’re making these positions unattainable to people who don’t have enough bank account to do it, then we’re doing exactly the opposite of that,” Janke added.
“I was on council when we had to make that very uncomfortable decision to go from being paid per meeting to an annual salary, and it looked like we got a huge pay increase at that time,” added councillor Laura Morrissette, who was on council in 2014, the last time a change to the overall remuneration policy was made. “But if you sat down, and figured out the amount of hours that we put in to try and represent the citizens of Weyburn, you know we don’t do it for the money.”
The review looked at the wages of city councillors in nine municipalities across the province, including Estevan, Humboldt, Warman and Martensville. The new policy outlines when per diems will be paid, what qualifies for councillors to be paid a per diem, and penalties for missing meetings. A review of the policy will also be done within five years.