With little comment from the public, the Honolulu Salary Commission on Tuesday recommended a 3% or greater pay boost for the mayor, managing director, all nine members of the City Council and other appointed, high-level city officials.
The collective pay hikes come less than a year after the Council received a controversial 64% salary increase while the Honolulu mayor’s nearly 12.6% pay jump ultimately surpassed similar compensation granted to Hawaii’s
governor.
Tasked with deciding whether to commit to future pay hikes for city employees, the Salary Commission held its latest hearing to set the city’s overall salary schedule for fiscal year 2025, which begins July 1.
A volunteer body, the commission — variously appointed by the Council and mayor — is expected to hold formal adoption of the city’s latest salary schedule by April.
But under unanimous vote by the five-member panel Tuesday, the mayor’s annual salary — which in 2023 increased to $209,856 from $186,432 — will now be $216,151.68, a 3% hike.
The new boost well exceeds the Hawaii governor’s over-$165,000 yearly pay.
Likewise, eight members of the Council — which in 2023 received a $44,400 pay bump that hiked their respective pay to $113,304, up from $68,904 — would see their annual pay rise to $116,712.
In 2023 three Council members — Radiant Cordero, Augie Tulba and Andria Tupola — formally rejected their 64% pay raises, keeping their Council compensation set at $68,904.
Still, the Council chair seat — which in 2023 saw a 60% pay jump, to $123,292 annually, up from $76,968 — will now see that pay rise to $126,712.
The city managing director’s pay will also increase, to $206,733, above what was already received in 2023, or $200,712, up from $178,320. The deputy managing director position
will similarly increase to $196,005, up from $190,296.
Other high-level city positions are expected to receive a nearly 3.6% pay hike — due, in part, to existing collective bargaining agreements still being negotiated between the city and Bargaining Unit 13, composed of professional and scientific employees — as the new fiscal year nears.
Some of those positions include:
>> Prosecuting attorney: to $206,028 from $198,888.
>> Police chief: to $239,964 from $231,648.
>> Fire chief: to $232,357 from $224,304.
>> Corporation counsel: to $199,788 from $192,864.
In addition, 14 department heads will see their pay jump to $194,219 from $187,488, while 14 deputy department heads will see salary hikes to $184,274 from $177,888.
According to the city, the nearly 3.6% pay increase does not include a nearly 2% annual step increase to pay per that bargaining unit.
Meantime, the city’s criminal and civil legal departments also see pay bumps.
Deputy prosecutors as well as corporation counsel deputies will both see their annual pay range rise to the same level: $78,112 to $195,711.
Currently, deputy prosecutors’ range of pay is $59,112 to $188,928, while corporation counsel deputies earn $75,144 to $183,216 a year.
The Salary Commission also approved an annual salary of $400,000 for the city’s chief medical examiner, now earning $363,144. And it boosted the deputy medical examiner’s pay to $391,116, a post that now earns $354,168.
To mull proposed pay
increases, a study was
conducted by the commission’s subcommittee — known as a permitted interaction group, or PIG — that, in part, recommended the Council should have its annual salaries boosted to $116,712.
However, the same subcommittee did not recommend a salary increase for the Council chair above what that position received in 2023.
But before Tuesday’s vote, Salary Commission Chair Malia Espinda
said she wanted to see compensation, especially for positions like Council members, be comparable to the rest of the city’s executive manager positions.
“If we go downwards, I find it to be a slippery slope,” she said, noting potential budget constraints at the city might prevent future raises. “I would like us to be consistent while we can be.”
Others, like commissioner Lila Tom, wanted to “ensure consistency” and see pay “preserve a sensible relationship with salaries of other city workers.”
At the meeting, a member of the public offered virtual testimony unrelated to Honolulu’s proposed pay raises. No one from the city spoke prior to the vote.
But in a March 15 written statement, Mayor Rick Blangiardi stated his opinion on the PIG’s proposed salary increases as first submitted in February.
“First, in crafting the FY2025 budget, my administration was mindful of the fiscal challenges confronting the city, including the expiring funds from the American Rescue Act Plan Act of 2021 (ARPA) … and the need to fund city operational commitments including, but not limited to, collective bargaining, critical staff salary increases and fringe costs, mass transit/rail operations, hazard pay and expanded public health and safety programs,” Blangiardi wrote.
The mayor added that “there is also ongoing uncertainty regarding the indirect negative impact the Maui wildfires recovery will have on the city’s FY2025 budget.”
“These factors and contingencies provide the city with little flexibility,” Blangiardi wrote.
The mayor noted the city’s issues over so-called pay inversion — when newer employees are paid more than longer-serving workers — was lessened by 2023’s city salary increases.
“The increases granted last year were designed to compensate covered officials for lost wages resulting from not having received earlier raises over the prior four years, raises granted to (Bargaining Unit) 13 employees and their excluded managers,” Blangiardi wrote. “While I acknowledge there remains some cases of inversion between the pay of city directors and deputies and some of the subordinates, because it was addressed in FY 2024, the issue is now not as acute.”
Meanwhile, compensation for all city workers will be included in the city’s proposed $3.63 billion operating budget.
Unveiled on March 1, the Blangiardi administration’s latest budget — expected to be adopted by June — is a 6.4% increase over the city’s current $3.41 billion spending plan.
