SLO County supervisors could give themselves a 26% pay raise and link salaries to judges
The San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors will consider a 26% pay raise for its members at its next meeting on Tuesday.
The raise would bump the supervisors’ annual salaries from $90,417 to $114,067 in three installments over a two-year period, according to a staff report.
The board isn’t just considering a raise, however.
The supervisors will also decide whether the county should connect supervisor salary raises with California Superior Court judge raises. According to the staff report, this would set board salaries at 50% “of the bottom salary range of California Superior Court judges.”
This would mean that each time California Superior Court judges get a raise, the supervisors would too — preventing board members from deciding their own salary.
At a board meeting May 2, Supervisors Bruce Gibson, Dawn Ortiz-Legg and Jimmy Paulding voted to discuss the new raise structure at the next meeting, while Supervisors Debbie Arnold and John Peschong dissented.
Arnold and Peschong said they would not support the raise.
“I just don’t think this is the time for the supervisors to be giving themselves a raise,” Arnold said, referencing the county’s budget gap and a $26.5 million bill for road damage caused by the winter storms.
Gibson, however, thought the board should discuss the raise now.
“It is never a good time for the Board of Supervisors to discuss its own salary, but this has been prepared by our HR Department. I think its worthy of our consideration at our next meeting,” Gibson said.
When the board considered a raise in February, Paulding voted against it, explaining that he wanted to build trust with his new constituents.
“The people of District 4 elected me to focus on the issues and tackle some big problems,” Paulding said in February. “I don’t think that they voted me in with the expectation that I would be increasing my salary from the get-go.”
Paulding did, however, vote to put the raise discussion on next week’s agenda, without indicating whether he would support it.
What does a 26% raise look like?
A raise is a long time coming, as supervisors haven’t accepted an increase in two years, the Tribune reported in February.
The board’s last wage increase was in May 2021, when the supervisors voted to bump their salary by 5% from $86,115 to $90,417.
This raise would be implemented in three phases.
First, on July 23, the supervisors’ salaries would jump from $90,417 to $97,697.
On June 23, 2024, their annual salaries would increase to $105,560, and on June 22, 2025, they would bump to $114,067, the staff report said.
Supervisor seats in Districts 1, 3 and 5 will be on the 2023 ballot. Supervisor Debbie Arnold is not running for office again, so she would not benefit from the June 2025 pay increase — as it would be implemented after her term ends.
If Supervisors John Peschong and Dawn Ortiz-Legg win another term representing Districts 1 and 3, respectively, they would benefit from the June 2025 raise during their next terms.
Even if the board votes to pass the raise, individual board members could choose to keep their current salary for the remainder of their term, according to the staff report.
If the supervisors approve this raise structure, they won’t have to consider their salaries again.
After the June 2025 raise is implemented, board salaries would be examined each year and increased “as necessary” to be 50% of the lowest paid California Superior Court judges — so each time those judges get a raise, the supervisors would get a raise too, the staff report said.
Ortiz-Legg suggested connecting supervisor raises with the judges at a board meeting on Feb. 7, explaining that other counties have successfully implemented similar raise structures.
This way, the board would never have to vote on its own salary, and the salary would naturally increase to adjust for cost of living, she said.
“In order to have good governance and good folks running for office, it needs to be a living wage,” Ortiz-Legg said in February.
