The Buffalo Common Council voted 5-3 Tuesday to increase their salaries, as well as the salaries of the mayor and the city comptroller by 12.63%, an amount recommended by the Citizens Salary Review Commission.
The Commission also recommended the same increase in the salaries of Board of Education members, but the Common Council instead approved an 87% pay raise, bringing Board of Education salaries from $15,000 to $28,000.
Speaking at the meeting, Council President Darius Pridgen said that the school board salary “needed an amendment of what the recommendation was."
The school board salary increase was a last-minute amendment, which was circulated to the councilmembers, but not provided to the public online.
The approved pay raises increase the Mayor’s salary by just over $20,000, the Comptroller’s salary by just over $15,000, and the Council’s salaries by almost $9,500. Altogether, the salary increases will cost taxpayers over $200,000 per year.
South District Councilman Christopher Scanlon, Lovejoy District Councilman Bryan Bollman, and North District Councilman Joseph Golombek, Jr. voted against the pay increases. University District Councilman Rasheed Wyatt was absent from the proceedings due to a family matter.
The increases take effect Jan. 1.