We Feel Your Pain

At the beginning of the year, our earnest Boy Wonder of a Mayor said that in the spirit of sharing the pain of the inevitable budget cuts, he would cut his own salary 15% percent. The total amount of his cut? $25,000 -- taking his salary down from the $168,867 being Mayor pays. Sure living on a salary around $140,000 isn't that difficult. And sure it's easy to give up money when you're already rich. Or the wife has a high-paying gig. Or you have the Gettys around in case you need a few bucks. But we appreciate the effort. He then called on other high-wage earners who worked for the City Government to do the same thinking that if others followed suit, that $25,000 the Mayor was saving could turn into much more, $10,000,000 more. Considering how bad the cuts are turning out to be, that little could still mean a lot.

The amount of people in the City government who followed suit? Thirty. That's out of a total of 400 employees who make more than $100,000. Total amount of savings? Slightly under $100,000, which is a lot less than $10,000,000 dollars Newsom hoped to get. City government employees who volunteered for the paycut include Assessor-Recorder Mabel Teng, Public Utilities Commission Director Susan Leal, and Muni General Manager Michael Burns. As for the Board of Supervisors, their salary was already cut by $22,000, not for budget issues, but based on recommendations of the Civil Service Commission (which, for those who are wondering, means it pays $90,000 to be able to curse out people in hearings, errr, we mean speak passionately in defense of the poor against evil running-dog property owners). Way to share the pain, there everyone. And so we ask, where is Chronicle Watch when we really need it?