Letter to the Editor: High pay raises and high taxes

To the Editor

The pay raises the senior administrators at Scugog Township awarded themselves, in 2018 & 2019, far exceeded the cost of living adjustments negotiated for CUPE-represented staff, as seen in the chart below. One former manager received a 15.7% higher compensation, despite leaving the employ of Scugog Township mid 2019. The Library CEO’s salary ($118,231.00) appears on the Sunshine list for the first time. The efficiency savings found last year will not be returned to the taxpayers, rather, they will be used to expand the township’s empire in the future. With the current Covid-19 crisis, people are losing their jobs, while at the same time the township have confirmed that “cost of living adjustments and step increases were provided to all staff earlier this year and there are no plans to reduce these…”. Will our elected representatives do anything about it? The non-obligatory position of the CAO ($165,673.55), who acts as a prop for the mayor’s office, is surplus to requirement. The well paid directors and managers are, and should be, more than capable of representing their own departments without influence when advising council. When your tax bill arrives next month, ask yourself, do you really think the poor state of Scugog’s roads is the number one priority on the minds of our administrators?

Sincerely Sharon Dodgson-Smith Scugog