Lawmakers should vote on pay raises

Once again, state politicians confront a delicate political problem: Should they get a raise? In the last few weeks, salary commissions for both the city and state have recommended pay increases for lawmakers and other government officials.

City Council members declined last year to accept pay raises and may do so again, through a vote on a 4 percent salary increase recommended by the Honolulu Salary Commission. Whatever one’s opinion on the proposal, the vote alone would demonstrate the superiority of the city’s method of handling this issue.

On the state level, members of the Legislature can accept raises without accountability, due to a clever constitutional amendment approved in 2006 that allows the state salary commission’s recommendations to go into effect without legislative action.

In March, the state commission recommended 2 percent raises for governors, judges and lawmakers. Last week, the city commission recommended salary increases for the mayor and other top administrators as well as for Council members.

Unlike the Council, which can accept or reject individual recommendations, the Legislature can only reject the guidance in its entirety. So Council members can reject pay raises for themselves while approving them for others as they see fit. For state lawmakers, if they don’t get a raise, no one does.

The Council’s method allows for more flexibility in managing salaries at the top, allowing raises where they would be most effective and rejecting them where excessive or imprudent.

Council members, who receive $52,446 each, last year unanimously rejected a 3 percent pay raise for themselves and for the Council chair, who now gets $58,596.

State legislators as well as judges and administration officials took 5 percent pay cuts in 2009 because of the recession. Legislators now receive $46,272 and the commission has recommended 2 percent raises annually through January 2018, bringing their salaries up to $62,604.

The Council meets year-round and it’s considered a full-time job. The Legislature meets for 60 days over a four-month period each year.

Hawaii is among 23 states that have part-time legislatures. The average annual pay of legislators in those states is $35,326, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

However, Rep. Calvin Say, who was House speaker at the time of the constitutional amendment, insisted that the Legislature "is a full-time obligation" that should reflect salaries accordingly. Present Speaker Joseph Souki said, "I don’t have a problem with the (commission’s) recommendations."

They may be right. But it’s worth a public discussion.

Sam Slom, now the lone Republican senator, opposed the 2006 amendment and proposed during the current session that it be erased from the state Constitution. Instead, he urged that legislators "deliberate and vote upon their own changes in compensation as a means of making them more accountable to the members of the public whom they serve." Unfortunately, his proposal died upon submission.

Council Chairman Ernie Martin says he is inclined to reject the current pay raise recommendations for the city.

"Although we are close to turning the corner on economic recovery," he noted, "we are not quite there yet." No doubt his views and others will be fully aired at a public hearing by the commission scheduled for April 16.

At the very least, legislators should emulate the Council’s openness and give up-or-down votes on the state commission’s recommendations, after a full public hearing. After all, it’s the public that’s signing the checks.