Apr. 29—SOMERSET, Pa. — Whoever emerges victorious this fall from an eight-candidate race for Somerset County's three commissioner seats will be among the region's highest-paid occupants of the elected post.

That goes for the county's row officers, too.

Despite moves by the commissioners in 2017 to cut back annual pay increases, annual salaries for both Somerset County's commissioners and its row officers appear to rank among the highest in western Pennsylvania, a 2023 salary comparison shows.

Somerset County's commissioners earn $78,847 each this year, topping the salary for Cambria County's commissioners by 11%.

Cambria County's commissioners, elected to run a county just under twice the size of Somerset County, earn $70,889 apiece — a few hundred dollars more per year than Somerset County's acting sheriff, treasurer, clerk of courts and prothonotary.

The pay difference is nothing new — nor was the trend forged over the past three years by Somerset County's current board of Commissioners Gerald Walker, Colleen Dawson and Pamela Tokar-Ickes. Rather, it was the result of decades of annual pay increases, including ones during a 2008-era recession that saw other counties — including Cambria County — freeze their top elected officials' pay, according to historical salary figures examined by The Tribune-Democrat.

But it's drawing scrutiny just the same during a heated election year that has seen Somerset County facing steady pressure to raise wages for rank-and-file employees who are working — and, in some agencies, filling extra shifts — in the shadow of a nationwide labor shortage.

The current Somerset County commissioners noted this week that prior commissioners' boards set the raise rates that led to the annual salaries — both for the commissioners and for row officers such as the recorder of deeds, treasurer and prothonotary.

Over the past seven years, Somerset County commissioners tightened the belt on raises to a maximum of 3%, tying raises to an inflation-linked formula that slowed them to a trickle, at times, before hitting that 3% cap in 2021 and 2022.

Inflation surged to a 40-year high last summer.

"The thing about approving (the formula) four years ahead of time is that no one can predict what's going to happen that far down the road," Tokar-Ickes said. "That's why that cap was put in place."

The current commissioners have been under fire for the past year from several row officers — and, increasingly, some county residents and unions — for acting too slowly to adjust employee wages for unions and departments hit hard by the labor shortage.

The county commissioners struck early deals with some local bargaining units last year, prior to deadlines, but they've also called for a methodical approach to pay increases, stating that they are striving to stay within their budget to avoid raising taxes on property owners.

Somerset County resident Lester Younkin argued at Tuesday's commissioners' meeting that there's a glaring discrepancy between the county's elected leaders and its employees.

He held up a sheet listing 23 sixth-class Pennsylvania counties — those with populations between 45,000 and 89,000 — that indicated that Somerset County commissioners' salaries were the highest among them, in a few cases by more than $35,000, he said.

"They are the highest-paid of any sixth-class county in the state," said Younkin of the commissioners' salaries, while describing entry-level wages in departments such as the county 911 center as "poverty-level."

"It's not right," he said after the meeting.

The Tribune-Democrat wasn't able to immediately verify elected officials' salaries in all of Pennsylvania's sixth-class counties this week, but annual wages for a handful of nearby counties were confirmed, revealing those salaries vary widely from county to county.

In the region, only Westmoreland County — a third-class county of about 353,000 people with a $400 million budget — pays its commissioners and row officers more than Somerset County.

Larger sixth-class counties — including Indiana and Clearfield counties, whose populations exceeded Somerset County's in the 2020 census — pay their commissioners significantly less, figures provided by county staff confirmed.

Clearfield County's commissioners will earn $50,672 each this year. Indiana County, which has 81,000 residents, is paying its commissioners $69,164 apiece.

Blair County, a fifth-class county that includes Altoona, pays its commissioners $77,210 each, the county's chief clerk confirmed, while commissioners in Fayette County — a fourth-class county like Cambria County — earn $63,497 each, documents show.

Some counties saw their elected officials' pay significantly boosted by inflation-related increases in 2023. Westmoreland County's annual salaries for its commissioners grew by more than $7,000 — or 7% — in 2023 through the county's inflation-tied formula. That boosted their pay from $85,000 to more than $92,000, The Tribune- Review reported in December.

How it happened

In Pennsylvania, sitting commissioners cannot set their own salaries. Rather, they decide once every four to six years how pay increases will be calculated for commissioners in the next elected term.

Annual raises are based on the consumer price index for Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania and New Jersey that is calculated each year by the U.S. Department of Labor. That index takes into account average consumer spending on food, energy and other cost-of-living expenses over the past 12 months.

The rate is capped at 3% in Somerset County, meaning that raises can't exceed 3% even if the inflation rate soars like it did in 2022.

Tokar-Ickes, the board's most veteran commissioner, said it has been a common practice in Somerset County for a new commissioners' board to make the decision for the next term soon after taking office — meaning that they determine the formula that will impact salaries four years down the road.

In this case, the current board of Tokar-Ickes, Walker and Dawson voted in 2020 to continue capping any raises at the Consumer Price Index or 3%, whichever is lower, from 2024 through 2027.

The past two years were the first years those raises hit the 3% mark, salary figures show.

Between 2016 and 2020, salaries inched up by less than 1% to 2.2%.

Salary figures from the past 20 years show Somerset County's board saw raises as high as 5% leading up into the 2008 recession.

Tokar-Ickes, who was a member of a prior board of commissioners in the early 2000s, said that at one time the county's raise rate was directly tied to inflation, which meant raises climbed at higher rates until commissioners halted that practice.

At the same point in Cambria County, then-Commissioners P.J. Stevens, Milan Gjurich and William Harris instituted a four-year freeze of all elected officials' pay as part of broader cost-cutting steps to repair years of deficit spending by a prior board. Until that occurred, Cambria County's elected officials earned slightly more than their southern neighbors, newspaper archives show.

Walker said one of his first steps after assuming office in 2016 was to further tighten Somerset County's raise formula for elected officials, which was set at the Consumer Price Index plus 1%. The 1% add-on was removed, said Walker, who worked alongside then- Commissioners James Yoder and the late John Vatavuk at the time.

Board weighs options

The Somerset County commissioners expressed skepticism on Tuesday that their salaries were far above those of their peers in similarly sized counties.

Dawson said she's filed a written request for sixth-class county officials' salaries statewide to get a clearer picture of the county's standing. She said it's her belief that Younkin is relying on outdated figures — something the Somerset man disputes.

"I know there are a lot of questions about this," Dawson said.

Regardless, Dawson, who joined the board in 2021, noted that row officers in the county have seen their pay rise at the exact same level, adding that raises have been equal percentage-wise across the board.

By state law, counties must set a fixed percentage for raises, guidelines show.

"We've been using the same formula for everyone," Tokar-Ickes added Thursday.

After being asked about the difference between salaries for many of Cambria and Somerset counties' elected officials, Tokar-Ickes said there's likely no way to address that until commissioners are sworn into office in January to consider 2028 salaries.

"If I'm part of that (board)," she said, "I'd vote to freeze all elected county officials' salaries in the county of Somerset."

Cambria County Controller Ed Cernic Jr. said it was "surprising" to see Somerset County elected officials' salaries "that far" above those of peers in larger counties. But even as a longtime fiscal watchdog, he said, that didn't mean he was suggesting any counties should be lowering wages.

Inflation has sent salaries skyrocketing in the private sector, he said.

County governments should never strive to top the private job market in pay, Cernic said — but they must remain somewhat competitive to attract capable candidates for jobs that put them in charge of massive budgets and hundreds of employees.

The Cambria County commissioners, for example, oversee $200 million budgets annually that impact more than 400 employees, a prison, and departments that address the complex needs of 133,000 urban, suburban and rural residents.

"A lot of retail store managers make more than $50,000 to oversee maybe 20 people now," Cernic said after being informed that commissioners in several area counties earn less than $60,000.

"I'm never in favor of spending tax dollars for big pay increases, but wages also have to be fair to attract qualified candidates," Cernic said.

It's a balancing act, he added.

"Elected officials have traditionally been hesitant to raise salaries, but you have to keep up with inflation," Cernic said.