Salaries and Expenses Rise at City Hall
Prince George, B.C. – The evening, Council will be receiving the annual report on remuneration and expenses for all employees and Council for the City of Prince George and the numbers are up.
The Statement of Financial Information for 2016, indicates the City had 955 employees last year, that’s 34 more than had been reported in 2015.
Of those 955 employees , 289 were pulling in salaries greater than $75 thousand dollars a year. The number of people making more than $75 grand in 2016 is an increase of 17 over the previous year’s numbers.
There are ten employees who are making more than $150 thousand a year, with City Manager Kathleen Soltis at the top of that list. Her salary last year was $239,983.88.
Last year, the total remuneration to all employees was just over $55 million dollars.
When it comes to Mayor and Council, Mayor Lyn Hall tops the list for expenses in 2016.
His $13,591.84 in expenses last year, doubled what he had spent in his first year in office.
Councillor Garth Frizzell, is in second place with $10,720.57 in expenses, largely attributed to his work with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, which, while reimbursing his expenses, those reimbursement payments may not have been received before the December 31st, 2016 deadline.
Here are the numbers for Mayor and Council:
| Name | Remuneration | Expenses 2015 | Expenses 2016 |
| Everitt, Frank | $32,520.01 | $4,588.74 | $4,967.90 |
| Frizzell, Garth | $32,520.01 | ($3,703.19)* | $10,720.57 |
| Hall, Lyn | $101,921.95 | $6,392.96 | $13,591.84 |
| Koehler, Albert | $32,520.01 | $5,547.48 | $3,484.26 |
| Krause, Murry | $32,520.01 | $3,171.98 | $5,356.46 |
| McConnachie, Terri | $32,520.01 | $3,785.53 | $2,958.61 |
| Merrick, Jillian | $32,520.01 | $4,070.00 | $3,507.66 |
| Scott, Susan | $32,520.01 | $2,809.89 | $5,360.70 |
| Skakun, Brian | $32,520.01 | $1,409.14 | $1,887.92 |
- Councillor Frizzell had an expense deficit in 2015 as payments made from FCM expenses in 2014 came in past the previous year’s deadline
Comments
55 million dollars in salaries alone for City employees is absolutely insane. No wonder taxes and fees are constantly rising. This is not sustainable.
One would hope that they can explain why they hired an additional 34 employees since 2015.
friends? family? political donations?
It depends what total remuneration means! If it includes all the loaded costs, it works out to $57,591.62/ year or 28.79/hr. I suspect that is just a wage and the Pension and Benefits are on top. If Pension and Benefits are included in the total renumeration, well then it’s not so bad.
The Statement of Financial Information shows a line item to Pension Corporation for $9.42 million dollars. As benefit packages are about 1/3 of wage cost the all in cost for wages and benefits is likely closer to $73 million.
One other item stuck out like a sore thumb…..
676846 BC Ltd. Dba Shooters Bar & Grill 89,830.54
Why does the city spend an average of $7500 a month at a bar? If anything it is us that need a shot or two as property taxes are due in a couple of weeks! Make mine a double:P
It is not sustainable like axman said
It’s not sustainable ? Really ? What a strange statement . That statement would only be true if our society put an end to our right to levee taxes to provide services , like in Somalia . I am looking forward to paying my property taxes this week . I very much like the services provided by the money we provide by our contribution to our society .
Our aging population combined with the ever increasing size of our publicly funded workforce means that at some point, the money going out will exceed the money coming in. You can increase taxes all you want but you’ll reach that tipping point at some time.
Since you like paying property taxes can you pay mine while you’re at it? Thanks.
I guess you missed the “my ” in regards to property taxes . I thought you disliked freeloaders as much as do I . I would not want to be one of those . I’m also glad I took care of business when I was young, so that I wouldn’t feel the bite of poor planing now that I am old .
I was being facetious with my request to pay my taxes. I forgot the smiley face.
If you are indeed as financially secure as you claim you are very much in the minority. There are a lot of people out there spending for today with no regard for tomorrow. It’s a pending disaster. CPP is only a supplement nowadays, no one can live of it yet it’s the only retirement plan a lot of people in the public sector have.
Despite what people believe are unfair wages the City of PG is paying the average wage comparable to other cities of its size in the province. Yes I don’t agree with what some of those people earn and I want accountability for those that make those wages.
By far and large the average city median wage is around the provincial average of 50-70,000 per year which is very acceptable
Can’t compare apples and oranges.. some cities have a good tax base whereas we in PG are dependent on households rather than industry
Butt 55 mil is a lot.. tooo much
Time to cut all managers wages by 10%. $240,000 to run a city of 80,000? Seems a bit high..
I know some of these employees are firefighters that break the 100,000 mark..and they put their lives on the line for us..
I understand it costs money to run a city.. but why are our taxes so high compared to others?
Would be nice to see what impact the $350,000 audit actually had…
The City has a population of 74,003 2016 census. It is the first time in over 10 years that it has increased. It has been more than that a couple of decades ago.
The Fraser Fort George Regional District has a population of 94,506 with a rate of increase slightly higher than PG
It might seem high to you.
2016 salary for PG City Manager = $239,983.88.
2014 salaries is best I can find on the Vancouver Sun’s database, so keep that in mind when comparing.
Nanaimo, City Manager = $231,357
Chilliwack CAO (city manager) = $239,688
Kamloops, City Administrator = $245,560
Even though Kelowna population is significantly higher than the above, I have included it because they have a Deputy City Manager which raises the $ paid for City Manager function considerably higher.
Kelowna, City Manager = $271, 475
Kelowna, Deputy City Manager = $195,662
I cannot see where The PG City Manager’s is abnormal in BC’s municipal salaries.
I cannot see where The PG City Manager’s is abnormal in BC’s municipal salaries.”
2016 Population for those communities you listed:
Nanaimo – 158,787
Kamloops – 90,280
Chilliwack – 83,788
Prince George – 74,003
If we want to see a difference in how this City is run – we need a clean sweep of City Council. This bunch has to go!
Especially the six that have been on previous councils. I hope you all remember the past 3 years with this bunch in October of next year. Because 6 months out, they’ll try to tell you they’ve changed. Sad part is, most will believe it
It’s called math :)
Filtered
The math is the simple part. The hard part is knowing that you are counting the same things.
Learn something about urban areas.
There is a difference between city limits population and census agglomeration area.
Your Nanaimo figure is for the “Regional District of Nanaimo”
There is the City of Prince George, the CA of PG and the Regional District of Fraser Fort George.
The CITY of NANAIMO population is 90,504 in 2016 census.
You also got the Regional population wrong … it is 155,698 in 2016 census.
If you want to excel at research, then you have to be a bit more accurate.
Filtered and P Val ……
If you want to show that you have the ability to improve on my research then you should find the 2016 salaries of the city managers for Nanaimo, Chilliwack and Kamloops.
one example was the painting of Queen Jillian’s hallowed bike lanes last fall just before snowfall, which were used all winter to store road snow, and of course all the sand spread on it has make the paint very faint, meaning another paint job and more money.
and all the trips that could have been handled with a skype call for free.
there are two, no doubt there are lots more
Skype calls is utter nonsense….
There are more air miles logged these days than ever before to meet people and see other environments and networks.
Those who mow lawns, clean sand off streets, put sand on streets, plow snow, plant flowers do not use skype nor do they travel on city business….
The vast majority stay put ….. when more should be seeing what others do and learn something rather than pretending they know it all …. that is part of the problem …
This is an annual expense report in isolation. It shows the cost of work input.
It has no attempt at production output associated with it.
Most importantly, it has no contract expense report, nor production output associated with those contracts.
We do not know whether there has been a change in the amount of contracting out which may have resulted in additional internal staff.
It is a useless report by itself, other than to feed the frenzy of those who love to comment every year on the salaries at the City.
———————————
The number of employees has increased by 3.7%
The percentage of employees making more than $75,000 = 30.3%
There was an increase of 6.3% in the number of employees making more than $75,000
There will come a time when very few full time City employees will make below $75,000
The other stat that is missing, is what is the change in full time versus part time employees.
Also, what is the average hours worked for full time employees.
What are the total hours worked for part time employees.
And on and on it goes to get a bit more of a picture of what is happening.
I am not even mentioning departmental and program changes.
We are really left in the dark about those types of indicators of changes in the workforce.
Essentially, this kind of report just raises the ire of the general population. I do not know why the City does not provide more information …… well, actually I do …. LOL … this is all they are required to provide.
The more reports/detail that is written requires more people to do it. Communication is not magic. The provincial government has a Communications Officer on every floor of every building in Victoria. That way we get the message. The right message. I mean the correct message.
How about lazy journalist 250 gets UNBC’s numbers and checks salaries vs another arm of the province. Cities and schools and universities are all constitutionally provincial bodies. Fair to compare!
Those numbers are all publicly available. If you feel the need to compare and contrast get off your butt and do it.
“The more reports/detail that is written requires more people to do it.”
That is correct. As a manager I require financial data as one of several inputs for decision making purposes.
The City should have some of the kinds of data I am referring to. If they do not, then they are flying by the seat of their pants, not based on knowledge, just by the way the political wind is blowing.
“I know some of these employees are firefighters that break the 100,000 mark..and they put their lives on the line for us.”
I am sorry, but that is a feeble excuse. There are many firefighters who are volunteer who do the same. Also there are many cities in the USA who pay considerably less.
gopg Agree with you. There are many other trades that people work in that are just as dangerous as being a firefighter and the pay is much less.
Top 10 most dangerous jobs in the US: It’s not police officers & firefighters who have the most risky career path
In the region of present day Canada, between 1848 and 2010, 1,000 firefighters died while fighting fires. That averages out to about 6 per year in the entire country.
That is a long time with very poor firefighting equipment and knowledge in the early day ….. in fact, it was not even Canada in 1848 ….
Think of manual tree fallers ….. think of construction workers.
One has to take into consideration the numbers employed so that one can get a rate.
So here are some figures from the US in 2012, including US salaries
Deaths per 100,000 workers,source = finances on line ..
Loggers = 127.8 average annual pay $34,600
Fishers = 117 ….. $36,900
Pilots, flight engineers = 53.4 ….. $128,800
Roofers = 40.5 ….. $38,800
Structural iron/steel workers = 37 …… $50,700
Refuse, recyclable material collectors = 27.1 …… $35,200
Electrical power line installers repairers = 23 ….. $62,300
Truck and other drivers = 22.1 ….. $27,700
Farmers/ranchers = 21.3 ….. $73,700
Construction labourers = 17.4 ….. $34,500
Tell me one city of 80 thousand that has “volunteer firemen”. Also the US dollar is worth about 35 percent more, so that 100 thousand Canadian is about 65 thousand US
“Tell me one city of 80 thousand that has “volunteer firemen”
Why?
The issue is people putting their lives at risk.
YOU tell me one reason why volunteer firemen, who likely have less time to train, poorer equipment, etc. are less at risk than full time firemen.
Don’t digress. Stay on point.
“Also the US dollar is worth about 35 percent more”
It is now. It was not 2 years ago. They live and buy things in the US, not Canada.
Irrelevant comment.
The City of Prince George has a huge solid tax base, that generates over $150 Million in revenue every year, and they make bloody sure they spend every cent.
I have yet to see a concerted effort to cut costs, and reduce taxes. Seems all they can do each year is raise taxes and service charges.
One other thing that sticks out to me is how little debt will be retired over the next five years while we continue to pile it on for things like new mobile equipment, offices etc at Ospika yard , pools and firehalls, picnic shelters, library entrance……………..
Agree.
I think that the Annual Reports could be written in a more user friendly manner so that the average person can understand them better.
I feel they can do a better job of reporting on program net costs as well as project net costs to show value for $.
For instance, one “service program” which came to light recently is that BCTransit tries to encourage densification of the urban environment.
It does that by funding those communities which increase their population densities along transit routes to a higher percentage.
I would like to see reports of how well we are doing with that.
Then again, that may not be what the PG community wants. They may like the housing mix we currently have.
Why the perennial complaint of high taxes in PG. We had a 2200 sq ft home in PG in 2014 and our taxes were $1100.00. We have 1500 sq ft townhome in Abbotsford and our taxes are $1600.00
Cheers
I’m not so sure that I believe your PG numbers at all, Retired 02!
Cheers!
Wage for Toronto City Manager (2013) was $363,234 – Population of Toronto in 2013 was 2,791,140 – Wage for the Mayor of Toronto (2014) $ 177499 – Wage for Prince George City Manager – 239,983.88 – Wage for our Mayor is $101,921.95 + $13591.84 for expenses = $115,513.79 Population of Prince George 80,000 – I used Toronto as an example because I have a lot of family there. But I think we have a problem in our fair City. Why don’t we have the money to replace an aging fire hall and pool, why do we need to borrow all of the time. 50 million is the replacement cost on the mentioned facilities, but what will be the true cost with interest charges etc.? We are not being told that are we?
I have a 40 year old 1300 sq ft house my taxes are 2700.
I’m shocked that salaries and expenses AND the size of our municipal workforce have all increased here in PG!
Shocked I say!
Mmmmm, no I’m not!
In good economic times and in bad economic times, if there is one thing that we can count on, it’s an increase in the cost of our public sector!
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