Our poor councillors

It would probably be political suicide for city councillors to hike their own expense accounts during a recession.

With local unemployment topping 13% because of plant closures and the recession, residents wouldn’t put up with it. Brantford’s councillors know this. So, even if they hadn’t vowed to hold the line on the municipal budget to 0% — which may be mere lip service or lip-synching — councillors won’t be foolish enough to do it.

The issue came up this past week at Brantford’s finance committee, as councillors found themselves in the awkward position of debating their own worth.

The problem is that after getting taxpayers to fork the bill for their wages and their benefits package, there’s little left to pay for the other expenses they ring up in the line of duty: mileage, use of cellphones, Internet, fax machines, attendance at conventions, and even home office supplies like ink cartridges.

I sympathize to a degree.

Our 10 part-time councillors make $22,625 a year; that’s not much when you consider they put in long hours and have to make themselves available to voters day and night. If they take the full benefit package, that maxes out at $7,242. A total of $30,000 does make the job more attractive.

Right now, those councillors who do take the full benefit package are left with little money for expenses — $1,184 to be exact. 

“When you look at this, you can’t leave the phone on with what we’ve got,” Coun. John Sless complained.

It certainly isn’t enough in today’s wired world, where councillors need the Internet and cellphones or a BlackBerry — as they’ve been urged to get — to be accessible to residents.

Those councillors who don’t take all the benefits can have thousands of dollars more for expenses under the current system.

But that’s probably changing now. Councillors are leaning towards averaging out what is left over and dividing up the pot, leaving them $3,010 each for expenses. This seems fair and reasonable.

The total bill will be the same and it won’t cost taxpayers any more dough.

Still, Sless voiced his frustration over being, in a sense, nickel-and-dimed over expenses. He said council has talked about hiking the expense budget for years, to reflect modern needs, always looking for a good time to do it, such as when the economy is booming. But that day never comes. “I’ve been here 19 years and it’s never gotten better.”