Should these changes be ratified at this week\u2019s Council meeting, pay will be made retroactive to the start of this Council term and be funded from Council\u2019s tax rate stabilization reserve rather than directly on the taxpayer, until 2025. The Auroran, however, understands an amendment to take the retroactive adjustment off the table was due to be made after this week\u2019s press deadline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Council members gave tentative approval to the wage increase last week, with Ward 5 Councillor John Gallo, who proposed a series of small tweaks that were ultimately accepted by the majority, stressing that these recommendations came from the Town\u2019s Council Compensation Review Committee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those in favour of the pay raise said it was an uncomfortable position to be in as Council compensation for an incoming term is typically set at the end of the outgoing term of Council, but agreed the proposed salary it was fair for the work they do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Vocal opposition, however, came from Mayor Tom Mrakas who said, given affordability concerns across the board, this was not the time for a pay raise.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe Committee\u2026recommended compensation be in line with Newmarket,\u201d said Councillor Gallo, presenting a series of slides on the recommendations. \u201cThe intent was to at least bring the Council compensation equal to across-the-board market, but specifically [with] what happens in Newmarket.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis isn\u2019t the way to do it, but I am trying to set things right,\u201d he added, noting the timing of the report coming nearly a year since the current Council came to office. \u201cI am sure the spotlight is on me\u2026but I tried my best to show the slides and give the data to defend why what I am putting forward\u2026is not that different than what the recommendations out of the Committee were. \u201cI strongly believe\u2026had this been done last term or this term, I can\u2019t imagine the numbers would have been that different. I think part of the benefit to this is it won\u2019t hit the tax base until at least 2025, half of it. To me, the general idea, which was born out of the Committee, was to bring it up to a level that is, I believe, responsible, but [comparable] to someone like Newmarket and many other municipalities that are equal to us. I am sure I will be coined as \u2018the classic politician that just wants to give themselves a raise,\u2019 but I hope I have done the Committee justice and the reporting out of that to identify why this is necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Speaking in favour of the recommendations, Ward 2 Councillor Rachel Gilliland went deeper into comparisons to other municipalities, noting that in some cases elsewhere Council members have assistants, something that is not the case in Aurora. There is value, she said, in looking at the workload shouldered by each elected member.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey are a little bit shocked by that,\u201d said Councillor Gilliland of when residents ask how much Council members currently make, adding compensation for elected members hasn\u2019t been revised since 2017. \u201cThis would be a correction, and we also didn\u2019t go down from 8 to 6 Councillors (in the 2018 election) without any kind of pay increase with that workload, so there was a savings of two Councillors on top of that\u2026which wasn\u2019t taken into consideration in this, so I don\u2019t think we\u2019re far off from the starting point.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Workload has long been a concern for Ward 3 Councillor Wendy Gaertner who has previously argued that Aurora\u2019s Council positions should be considered full-time jobs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While she too said she had an issue with the timing of the report and the recommendations, she ultimately supported what was before her.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis should not be a political topic and we\u2019re faced with that, although I have to say the Committee was arm\u2019s length from Council and they did their work,\u201d she said. \u201cI think it needs to be in Bylaw so this (timing) never gets overlooked again because it is not a good position for us to be in. Sometimes a resident will say to me, \u2018I didn\u2019t want to disturb you at your office\u2026\u2019 and we don\u2019t have an office. We have two desks and I have long thought that the work I do has been undervalued and I feel that this motion represents how a Councillor should be treated with respect.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Vocal support also came from Ward 1 Councillor Ron Weese and Ward 6 Councillor Harold Kim, with the latter stating that it was a matter of pay equity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMy view is if you\u2019re going to pay for a role, there is such a thing as pay equity\u2026 or you make it a volunteer position and make Councillors get paid zero. I would be more comfortable with being paid zero than being paid something far less than what is a comparator across the same ministry,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While he said he understood the issue of timing and public perception, he said Aurora Councillors have been \u201cunderpaid significantly\u201d compared to similarly-sized and structured municipalities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cFor me, it is about principle and pay equity,\u201d he continued. \u201cIn politics, there might be a tradition that any pay increase starts the following term to avoid that negative public perception, but I don\u2019t see how moving from $37,000 to something higher is a negative image perception. I think if you were to ask most members of the public and they asked how much you got paid, I think most people would be surprised how low it is and I share it all the time to anyone who asks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Mayor\u2019s pay, in his view, was \u201cdrastically underpaid based on the time he commits.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mayor Mrakas, however, said he disagreed with the recommendations and, at last week\u2019s meeting, was the only one to do so. Ward 4 Councillor Michael Thompson, who chaired the meeting, did not weigh in.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI have no issue if this was done as a normal process, which would be to approve this and to have this beginning in the next term. I do have an issue with this looking at it being extended or implemented during this budget, but also retroactive to the beginning of the term,\u201d said Mayor Mrakas. \u201cI have heard about the fact that we didn\u2019t do it last term. Yeah, there was a thing called COVID last term and we all sat here at the table and we didn\u2019t take a cost-of-living increase as well because we wanted to ensure we weren\u2019t putting extra pressure not only on our budget but the residents of our community.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He added that he didn\u2019t hear anyone in the last election cycle say, \u201cHey, Council is not getting paid enough.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI am actually shocked that some at this table considering [a raise] hearing about the fact we have high interest rates, high inflation, that residents are having problems buying groceries, can\u2019t afford their mortgages, and yet we want to take money that this isn\u2019t for building a facility, it isn\u2019t for a service for our residents to do better, to add value \u2013 this is getting tax money and putting it straight into the pockets of the people sitting around this table immediately. I am opposed to it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As the debate continued, Councillor Gilliland told Mayor Mrakas this was \u201can opportunity for you to put something forward that you\u2019d prefer.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI think your Council members would want to hear your thoughts on that,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI am opposed to this entire thing that is in front of us,\u201d he replied. \u201cI will continue to oppose it regardless of whether it is the 55th<\/sup> or the 60th<\/sup> percentile. I don\u2019t think we should be doing a retroactive increase. I disagree with the fact we\u2019re going to be burdening the taxpayers, the residents of our community, and not waiting until next year.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Councillor Gallo concluded his views by stressing this was \u201cnot a Mayor Mrakas thing for me, it\u2019s the position of the Mayor that deserves it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Should the recommendations approved at General Committee be ratified this week unchanged, Councillors will also see their annual vehicle allowance raised to $7,000, be allowed participation in the Ontario Municipal Employees Retirement System (OMERS) pension plan, participation in health and dental group benefits at the cost of the Town, severance for Mayor and Council increased to one month per year of service to a maximum of twelve months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This will be funded completely from the Tax Rate Stabilization Fund in 2023 and 2024 before things change in 2025. In that year, the raise will be shared 50 per cent by the reserve and 50 by the taxpayers. The impacts will be solely born by the tax rate beginning in 2026.<\/p>\n\n\n\n By Brock Weir Council could approve a pay raise for itself this week, following a contentious debate at October 17\u2019s General Committee meeting. If approved, Mayor Tom Mrakas will see his municipal salary rise from $96,200 per year to the \u201c60th percentile of market comparators\u201d (estimated to come out to an increase of $9,000 to $12,000 more per […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33747","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-8Mj","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-22 14:34:10","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33747\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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