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Save This PageIt pays to be part of Richmond Mayor L. Douglas Wilder's inner circle.
The mayor's top administrators got pay increases of tens of thousands of dollars to their six-figure salaries this fiscal year, a Richmond Times-Dispatch review of city government salaries found.
With one of the highest administrative overheads in the state -- a pattern Wilder says baffles him -- Richmond pays some of its top officials more than their state counterparts, the review found.
Generally, the biggest increases went to the very top officials, the ones who work most closely with the mayor, though some officials appointed by the City Council got pay increases of 10 percent.
The increases dwarf the 2 percent raise most City Hall employees received for the fiscal year that began in July and outpace the 5 percent increases in wages and salaries for the nation as a whole in 2007. They are higher than the 3.5 percent increases school employees received -- though the school system's top executive, Superintendent Deborah Jewell-Sherman, saw no increase this year to her $162,307 salary. School system employee pay and promotions are handled independently of City Hall.
This fiscal year's bill for City Hall's $100,000-plus-a-year men and women is up 28 percent from the year before -- the increase is very nearly the equivalent to what a penny in the city's real estate tax rate would generate.
"You've got to keep good people," Wilder said when asked about the increases. Wilder's $125,000 salary, which is set by the City Council, has not increased since his election.
The Times-Dispatch review found that Chief Financial Officer Harry E. Black received a 19 percent pay increase to bring his annual salary to $155,000. That's about $3,000 more than the state's secretary of finance.
Wilder had tried to name Black to the city's top administrative position last year, but City Council rejected the nomination.
Police Chief Rodney Monroe received a 20 percent increase, to $165,424, about $12,000 more than the superintendent of the Virginia State Police.
Richmonders generally give Monroe rave reviews for the sharp drop in crime since he took office as one of Wilder's first appointments -- nearly nine in 10 in a recent poll have a favorable opinion, and eight in 10 say they are satisfied with the city's efforts to fight crime.
The mayor has recently said that other cities are eager to recruit Monroe and that Richmond needs to retain him.
Other top officials winning big pay increases:
"These increases were given to bring people up to par," said Linwood Norman, who earns $97,678 as Wilder's press secretary.
Wilder also said that some large salary increases went to staff for the City Council, which he said is a part-time body.
The council's chief of staff, Daisy Weaver, won a 10 percent increase, to $138,915, while the council-appointed city auditor, Umesh Dalal, had a 10 percent increase to $132,300.
"I understand the need to be competitive, but if you won't cut the tax rate but give these big salary increases, it sends a message," said Councilwoman Kathy C. Graziano.
The Times-Dispatch review also discovered that when Wilder replaced top bureaucrats who left, the newcomers won salary deals worth far more than their predecessors.
Chief Administrative Officer Sheila Hill-Christian's $170,000-a-year salary is 28 percent higher than her predecessor, long-serving city employee William E. Harrell, who left to become city manager of Chesapeake. Her salary is 16 percent higher than what she earned at her previous job as head of the Virginia Lottery.
In addition, her pay exceeds what the governor of Virginia's chief of staff or his Cabinet secretaries receive by $18,000 a year.
Hill-Christian's pay lags Henrico County Manager Virgil R. Hazelett's $239,530 -- the result of 35 years of county employment and a steady climb up the ladder.
Henrico's police chief, Col. H.W. Stanley Jr., who has held that office for 13 years and been a police officer with the county for 45 years, makes about $800 a year less than Monroe, while the county's director of finance earns $36,000 less than Black.
"When you consider the responsibilities, experience and performance of each individual, the salaries are not at all unreasonable," said Norman. "Compared to those in similar positions in the surrounding areas, these salaries are market-driven and indeed reasonable."
But no one in the Henrico government has received pay increases like those in the city in decades, said George Cauble, human resources director.
"In Henrico County since the 1950s, we truly believe upper management should be treated the same as everybody in the pay plan. Same policy with salary increases, same policy with increases for promotion," he said.
"Laborers can't say they've been treated any differently than the county manager," said Cauble, who said a 20 percent increase would be inconceivable in Henrico.
County employees received a 4 percent increase last year. Cauble said employees earn an increase of 5 to 7 percent as they are promoted.
"I can't speak for anyone else, but that's the way we think it should be done," he said. Contact David Ress at (804) 649-6051 or dress@timesdispatch.com.
