Kelowna, B.C. city council approves 30% pay hike for councillors

Kelowna, B.C., council members voted on Monday to give themselves a pay hike that they say will keep their wages in line with their peers in like-sized B.C. cities.

The decision that five council members supported, and three voted against, will see the mayor’s salary increase to $145,000 from $126,497 while councillors will see their wages rise 30 per cent to $58,080 from $42,992 a year. Both are more on par with other large B.C. cities.

The wage gap between a councillor and the mayor is supposed to reflect time spent, city clerk Stephen Fleming explained during a presentation on the issue.

The mayor’s job is a full-time position, council members are considered part-time, and the expectation is that their wages reflect 40 per cent of the time the mayor spends at the job.

While all acknowledged there was some awkwardness in voting on their own taxpayer-funded wage, the prevailing sentiment is that the job has grown alongside the city, it requires a lot of time and to attract and retain new people and the wage needs to increase.

2:04 Kelowna council votes 6-2 in favour of densification bylaw

Some, however, indicated they thought it was a bit too much, too fast.

Coun. Rick Webber noted, as a first-time councillor, he hadn’t had an opportunity to debate wages before and the numbers he was presented with didn’t sit well with him.

“I talked to some friends of mine over the weekend and they said, ‘Of course if we (could) vote to give ourselves a 30-per cent raise, we’d love to give ourselves a 30-per cent raise,’ but in the real world you don’t get a chance to do that,” Webber said.

He also pointed out that during his time  as a broadcaster, he never had a boss approach him and say, “Look, you’re behind the other market so we’re going to give you a 30-per cent increase.”

Wage increases are generally tied to other factors, like taking on more responsibility.

That said, he agreed with the notion that local council wages falling behind wages in similarly sized cities wasn’t quite right.

“There may be a way to do it fairly for the taxpayer, where you have the inflationary increase augment it a little bit in the years ahead. But giving yourselves such a substantial raise to me doesn’t seem right,” he said.

This is something to which both Coun. Mohini Singh and Coun. Gord Lovegrove also alluded when they spoke.

Webber did, however, seem to think that the mayor had taken on more and he supported a mayoral pay hike.

The mayor’s wage, which until the Monday vote was $126,497, was said to come as a surprise to some of those Coun. Maxine DeHart spent time with during her weekend.

“I was shocked at the number of people that came up to me (at a Chamber meeting) and said, ‘You gotta be kidding, we never knew (about the wage)… especially the mayor,'” DeHart said.

She said she had several women go up to her and say, “‘I’m making more than the mayor. I can’t believe it.'”

Figures from the 2021 Statistics Canada Census indicate the median annual income of a man in the region was  $48,000, a woman at $36,800.

DeHart also said she and her council peers spend a lot more than 40 per cent of a full time job dedicated to the tasks they’ve been elected to perform.

According to the Community Charter and public expectations of the position, council members are required to attend and prepare for council meetings, which is generally 35 to 40 Mondays and 12 public hearings a year.

“They’re also generally expected to read and respond to public correspondence, interact with the public, are appointed to internal and external committees and boards, and they’re invited to community events,” city staff said in an email.

The bylaw will come to council for final approval in the next couple of weeks. Once the change has been approved the wage increase will take effect.

Coun. Loyal Woodridge was absent from the meeting.