MAYOR BLOG!: When I was elected mayor in April of 2012, I had many goals and objectives for my term. Shortly after taking office, I met with our staff and established over four pages of goals to work on during my term as mayor. For the last two months, the Finance Committee has been discussing one of those goals, raising the mayors stipend to $300 per month. This has been done in open meetings. At the July Council meeting, I addressed it in our televised setting. I will be asking the City Council to raise the stipend for mayor from $100 per month to $300 per month. When I ran for mayor I understood this was mostly a volunteer position. In fact, my tax preparer tells me that my $1200 per year stipend as mayor of Waynesville has cost me $500 in extra taxes. We pay a City Administrator to take care of everyday business of the City. I estimate that I spend 20-30 hours per week on City business. But, I do get benefits. I attend luncheons, a conference every year and many events representing the City and the citizens pay for those. When I travel outside Waynesville in my own car, I turn in my mileage only. I do not claim $.55 per mile, only gas. I did not run for mayor for the money, obviously. In researching Missouri cities through the Municipal League, I found that in cities our size, 4000-5000 citizens, we are paying the lowest amount of all. Other cities in our size category range from $10,800 per year to $3600 per year. Waynesvilles stipend is $1200. Among our neighbors, Rolla pays $8000 and Lebanon pays $34,000. This will not be effective until after my term is up in April of 2016, so it will not apply to my term as mayor. But, I do not want to be on the bottom of any list. A mayor who represents your City and does it well, should be compensated and that is why I have brought this forward and will call for a vote on it in September. Please contact your City Councilman to voice your approval or concerns about this.
Posted on: Mon, 08 Sep 2014 20:27:34 +0000
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