Mat-Su Assembly kills proposal to raise member salaries

What you need to know:

• The Mat-Su Assembly voted 6-2 to remove a proposed salary increase from its agenda, effectively killing a plan that would have raised Assembly pay from $13,100 to $45,000 and the mayor’s salary from $65,000 to $75,000.
• Assembly member Dmitri Fonov proposed the increase to adjust pay for inflation and rising health care costs. Assembly salaries have not been updated since 2009, while health care costs have increased significantly.
• The borough’s salary commission opposed the raise, recommending a smaller increase of about $7,000.

• Short on time but need the local news scoop? Get free weekly news in your inbox for Mat-Su, from Mat-Su.

PALMER -- A proposal to significantly raise Mat-Su Assembly members’ salaries will no longer come up for a vote after members opted to remove it from their agenda Tuesday, effectively killing the plan.

Matanuska-Susitna Borough Assembly and mayor salaries were last updated in 2009. The proposal would have boosted Assembly members’ annual salaries from $13,100 to $45,000 and raised the mayor’s salary from $65,000 to $75,000. It would have also updated the $15,100 salary paid to the Assembly member appointed as deputy mayor to fall in line with the pay received by the rest of the body.

The proposal was designed to update assembly and mayoral salaries to match the pace of inflation and increase pay rates well above members’ health care premiums, which have more than doubled since 2022, according to a fact sheet included with the measure. As currently set, the salary is about $5,000 more than the annual cost of the health plan, the fact sheet states.

Assembly member Dmitri Fonov proposed the measure. Fonov represents District 6, which includes portions of Palmer and Wasilla.

Mat-Su Assembly’s current pay is similar to rates received by assembly members in Juneau and Fairbanks, but about $47,000 below the salary for assembly members in Anchorage, according to a chart created by the borough’s volunteer Commission on Salaries and Emoluments, which is tasked with recommending pay changes for elected officials and some boards. In addition to their annual salaries, assembly members also receive borough health care valued at over $30,000 each year, commission members said during a meeting last month, plus life insurance and retirement benefits.

The Assembly voted 6-2 to remove the pay raise legislation and any discussion of the measure from the agenda, with Fonov and Assembly member Dee McKee voting no.

McKee said she voted against removal because she felt Fonov should have a chance to share his reasoning for the proposal.

Assembly member Michael Bowles voted for the removal but later asked the Assembly to backtrack that step to give Fonov a chance to present it. He said he opposes the measure, but thinks it's disrespectful to undercut another member's ability to introduce legislation for debate.

The Assembly voted 4-3 to deny its return, with Fonov, McKee, and Bowles voting to bring it back for debate.

Fonov first sought to introduce the measure during a regular assembly meeting last March. Rather than consider it at the time, the assembly voted to send it to the salary commission for review as part of its regular meeting scheduled for this year.

But that delay triggered especially bad timing for the proposal, putting it back on the Assembly’s agenda as the assembly and Mat-Su School Board face a series of contentious budget decisions, Fonov said in an interview. Tuesday’s assembly meeting included more than two hours of public testimony as dozens of parents and teachers asked for funding increases to halt proposed school closures.

“This was before any of the schools, or any cuts, or anything like that,” Fonov said in an interview Wednesday. “My position is not randomly coming up with the numbers, but making an inflation adjustment based on when the pay was established.”

Members of the salaries commission unanimously voted last month to reject Fonov’s proposal and instead propose a salary increase of about $7,000 to $20,000 annually, a step also recommended by the commission in 2021.

Although each assembly member now represents more residents than they did when the salaries were last changed due to the area’s population growth, their workload under borough code has not, commission members said. A substantial pay raise like the one proposed in the legislation should be tied to new work requirements, they said.

“They’re not required to do more. If they were required to do more, I might feel differently about it,” commission chair Jessica Viera said during the meeting.

While procedure rules allow Fonov to reintroduce the salary increase plan, he does not plan to do so soon due to pushback from other members of the assembly, he said.

-- Contact Amy Bushatz at contact@matsusentinel.com

This story was updated March 4 to clarify Assembly member Mike Bowle's position on the proposal.