Council pay,rail approval get the OK - San Antonio Express-News

Council pay, rail approval get the OK - San Antonio Express-News


San Antonio’s mayor and City Council members will start earning full salaries when the next term starts after voters approved a charter amendment Saturday to give the city’s lawmakers hefty raises.

Also, voters overwhelmingly backed another charter amendment that will give them a chance to vote on future streetcar or light-rail projects in the city.

With the passage of Charter Amendment 2, council members will earn $45,722 each year — the median household income in the San Antonio area — and the mayor will make $61,725, 35 percent more than that. Council members now earn $1,040 a year, or $20 a week, while the mayor makes $4,040.

Supporters of the measure argued that the lack of pay dissuaded qualified candidates from running for a council seat and noted that San Antonio is a rare major city that does not pay council members and the mayor living wages.

The rail measure, Charter Amendment 1, passed by a margin of roughly 2-1. It requires the city to get voter approval before contributing funding to a streetcar or light-rail project or allowing such a project to use city streets.

Two other charter amendments sailed to victory.

Charter Amendment 3 requires a special election instead of an appointment to fill a mayoral or council vacancy if there are more than 120 days left in the term. Charter Amendment 4 strips obsolete language from the charter.

Amendment 1 now leaves any future streetcar or light-rail proposal facing a new and substantial hurdle before it can break ground. It also bans the city from packaging the rail vote with another transportation initiative, such as road construction or bus system improvements.

The measure was put on the ballot after a wave of opposition emerged to VIA Metropolitan Transit’s proposed $280 million downtown streetcar. Last summer, the city and county pulled their support for the project, effectively killing it.

Despite the heated debate over the streetcar project, the fight over the charter amendment was quiet. VIA did not oppose it and even the leading streetcar critics acknowledged their campaign in support of the measure was low-key.

“People want the vote on these types of projects,” said Greg Brockhouse, who helped spearhead the fight against the streetcar plan. “I think they spoke loud and clear.”

Brockhouse also campaigned against the council-pay measure, but was up against most of the city’s former mayors and a political action committee, Sensible Pay for SA, that had the money to buy ads and send out mailers.

“Shouldn’t we have a system of government that is up to the times — not one that was crafted in 1951?” former Mayor Henry Cisneros said recently in support of the measure. “Shouldn’t we have … some fair recompense for those who spend the hours to make decisions, to act on the recommendations of city management, to hold public hearings and listen to the public speak, to have town hall meetings in their districts?”

Brockhouse contended now was not the time to start paying council members full salaries.

“I think we did reasonably well, given the resources we had,” he said.

Voters overwhelmingly rejected a council-pay amendment in 2004. That measure would have increased pay to $31,000 for council members and $41,000 for the mayor.

djoseph@express-news.net

Twitter: @DrewQJoseph