Members of Elliot Lake City Council voted to give themselves a six per cent pay raise Monday night, retroactive to Jan. 1, 2019.
In so doing, several councillors including Sandy Finamore and Ed Pearce, stated no one around the table who was elected to council last October did it for the money.
The issue came to a head after the Trudeau government voted last year to discontinue a long-established Canadian income tax exemption for municipally-elected officials. Local municipal members used to be allowed to shelter one third of their pay from income tax and CPP premiums as it was deemed that portion was provided to offset costs that elected people incur in the performance of their jobs, and was not regular income. Because of the federal government's decision, as of Jan. 1, the tax shelter came to a halt.
Council's options at Monday night's meeting were to do nothing and take a pay cut or vote themselves a raise to compensate for the actual shortfall. Elliot Lake CAO Dan Gagnon told council members the difference amounts to about six per cent of their gross pay. Councillor Finamore noted that members of Elliot Lake Council including the mayor haven't had a raise since 2005.
Prior to the vote to increase their pay, gross salary levels for Elliot Lake Council were Mayor Dan Marchisella $29,400, Deputy Mayor Luc Cyr $10,800 and all other councillors were at $9,800 each.
Under the new pay allocation the mayor's gross salary will increase to $32,400 per year, Deputy Mayor Cyr will receive $11,100 and the other five councillors will each get $10,200 this year. It means total pay for Elliot Lake Council will be about $94,500 in 2019. That's an increase of exactly $6,380.