City Council committee says after 20 years Fall River school board deserves a pay raise

FALL RIVER — School Committee member Kevin Aguiar on Monday made his pitch during a City Council Committee on Ordinances and Legislation meeting to amend a law so future school board members can be paid the same as fellow elected officials on the City Council.

The committee agreed with Aguiar, and went a step further by supporting the lifting of a salary freeze for the mayor, City Council and the School Committee, which went into effect in 2010.

Aguiar made his argument not as a School Committee member who has indicated that he intends to run for another term this November, but as a city resident, he said.

School Committee members earn a part-time salary of $7,197 annually, while city councilors are paid a part-time salary of $16,091 a year.

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Shawn Cadime, chairman of the council's ordinance committee, noted that School Committee members haven't seen an increase in pay since 2002, including consumer price index increases, which city councilors had received until 2010. In that year, all elected officials' salaries, including the mayor, were frozen when Fall River took a major hit in state aid at the time.

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“I have been advocating over the years, both the City Council and School Committee, serving on boards, that we need the most qualified people to run and to do the work that’s needed and to take it seriously. That’s why I wrote the letter,” said Aguiar.

The letter Aguiar referenced was sent to Mayor Paul Coogan and the City Council, asking for pay parity among the school board and council. That would mean a more than 123% pay raise for school board members.

Paying all six elected school board members the same as city councilors would amount to just over $53,000 annually.

The City Council would have to amend the ordinance that addresses salaries for school committees before it could go into effect.

Aguiar said before he proposed the change he researched other communities that address equal compensation for school boards and town and city councils.

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“So the model that I used was based on what I saw in another community,” said Aguiar. “I know that I feel strongly that we should be compensated in similar fashion. I respect the work that the council does, and I would hope the council respects the work the School Committee does. Although we are different bodies with different duties and responsibilities, we all work very hard as part-time elected officials.”

No increases for the School Committee in 20 years

Aguiar noted that the School Committee hasn’t received any increases in 20 years, “and that’s unheard of.”

He said the change in the city charter, which occurred in 2015, also took away health care benefits for those elected to the City Council and School Committee, “further stripping away something that might be beneficial to someone who is going to dedicate their time, sacrifices from their family to serve the community,” said Aguiar.

“We have been actually stripping away things, where I think we should be increasing the compensation and desire to get people to serve on the School Committee, the City Council, or the city boards, or anything. I think it's high time that we take a hard look at this.”

Cadime and City Councilor Pam Laliberte spoke in support of raising the School Committee’s salary in line with the council and to unfreeze the cost-of-living adjustments of elected officials’ compensation moving forward.

The two motions were approved by committee members Cadime, Laliberte, and Councilors Michelle Dionne and Andrew Raposo, and will be forwarded to the full City Council for further debate.

This article originally appeared on The Herald News: Fall River School Committee members may get a raise in annual salary