Council Unanimously Approves Pay Raise Resolution

They say Mayor Jim Suttle should have been more open about the raises he granted in January.

By Ashlee Pitzl

CREATED 3:27 PM

OMAHA -  City Council unanimously approved a resolution this afternoon, publicly stating their disproval of large pay raises granted by Mayor Jim Suttle.

This afternoon's vote was 7-0. The resolution was proposed by council members Franklin Thompson and Jean Stothert last week.  Stothert is running for mayor.

At issue is the lack of disclosure.  The raises ($25,000 for his Chief of Staff and Finance Director; $9,000 for the Public Works Director) were issued in January, but weren't made known to council or taxpayers until the Mayor submitted his latest budget.

City council said this afternoon it's not about politics, it's about taxpayers.  The resolution was met without opposition.  A representative for the group, Nebraskans For Prosperity, publicly thanked council.

"He's now backtracked on that agreement [to freeze pay raises in bad economic times] without a real reason other than his staff has worked really hard," said Brad Stevens.  "We're here to say. Plenty of Omahans work very very hard, and they're not seeing increases to their compensation of 20 percent or up to $25,000 dollars. So we believe that's an irresponsible argument."