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04/20/2006: "Salary Commission Meets"

(First Meeting of Salary Commission)
The newly appointed Salary Commission held their first meeting on Wednesday, and will continue to meet at each Wednesday. until they are able to agree on the level of salaries for the elected officials of San Juan County; the one notable exception to their purview is the District Court Judge, who's salary is set at the state level.

After brief opening statements by the Commissioners, Allen Lichter (the only Council member present) stated that we need a "strong Council and a strong administrative branch" and that the Salary Commission will be doing very important work by establishing an economic base for the county. He did not explain his statement, and no one asked. He then left.

Goldsmith gave a basic talk on how Counties and State work together (or not together) and gave a basic primmer on the three branches of government as well as differences between the state, municipal, and regional paradigms.

Under State law "(a) Six of the ten commission members shall be selected by lot by the county auditor from among those registered voters eligible to vote at the time persons are selected for appointment to full terms on the commission under (c) of this subsection. In noncharter counties, the county auditor shall select two commission members living in each commissioner's district. The county auditor shall establish policies and procedures for conducting the selection by lot. The policies and procedures shall include, but not be limited to, those for notifying persons selected and for providing a new selection from a commissioner's district if a person selected from the district declines appointment to the commission or if, following the person's appointment, the person's position on the commission becomes vacant before the end of the person's term of office.

The controversy in the process came from the actions of the County Council's role in approving the four members state law assigns to them as their limited role in the process: (b) The remaining four of the ten commission members must be residents of the county and shall be appointed by the county commissioner or executive with approval of the county legislative authority, or by a majority vote of the county legislative authority if there is no single county commissioner or executive. The persons selected under this subsection shall have had experience in the field of personnel management. Of these four members, one shall be selected from each of the following four sectors in the county: Business, professional personnel management, legal profession, and organized labor.

The controversy was still swirling around the Commission at their first meeting, and as Administrator Pro Tem David Goldsmith took the new commission through the history and the law that brought them together, he touched on the reason for the controversy, outlining the distinction to the Commissioners between a Conflict of Interest, and the Appearance of Fairness, within which it is an appearance, as opposed to an existing conflict, that separates the two.

At the next meeting the Commissioners will get to work by starting an interview process of the elected officials, as the first step toward making the determinations of, "what is the value to the community" that the officials provide, as it was put to the Commissioners by Goldsmith. He also informed them they were not to be concerned about the possible effect of the salary impacts on the County budget, as it was his job to make that work, not the Commissioners.