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Plague-related budget cuts in Wayne and Oakland counties don't yet touch top officials' pay.
"As local governments tighten their belts, not all share in the sacrifice," say a WXYZ headline atop a report by Ross Jones.
The Covid-19 pandemic has left a mammoth hole in government budgets big and small, prompting layoffs, furloughs and cuts to employees' hours affecting thousands.
But locally, leaders of two of the hardest-hit counties in Michigan aren’t sharing in the sacrifices being felt by their employees.
In Wayne, 227 employees will be laid off or furloughed and over 600 positions stay unfilled, chief executive Warren Evans announced late last month. "Employees affected include some of the county’s lowest-paid, like clerical workers, painters, typists and service workers," Jones reports. Two of Evans' executive assistants also are furloughed.
But Evans hasn't taken a cut to his $171,690 salary, nor has his executive staff or other elected leaders in Wayne County.
At Oakland's offices in Pontiac, the station says, 47 county employees have been furloughed and 153 are on reduced schedules.
But while 200 of his employees have taken cuts, [County Executive Dave] Coulter has not tightened his own belt. He is still receiving his full $201,193-a-year salary... Coulter' opponent in the upcoming election, Treasurer Andy Meisner, voluntarily gave up 10% of his county salary as the pandemic took hold.
The story is different in the City of Detroit where, on the same day he announced furloughs and layoffs of city workers, Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan instituted a 5% pay cut for himself and everyone making over $125,000 a year. The cuts affected 100 city employees.
At the state level, Gov. Gretchen Whitimer cut her own pay by 10% weeks before announcing layoffs of thousands of state employees, and cut her excutive staff's pay by 5%.
Meisner of Oakland County, in response to the WXYZ story, emailed Deadline Detroit:
During the Great Recession, I took a pay cut and refused the taxpayer-funded car, gas and cellphone because I believe in shared sacrifice.
Today, we face a great crisis that once again requires sacrifice by many, which is why I voluntarily took a 10% pay cut during the crisis, and call on others to do the same. Any additional amount that can pay for PPE or the salary of a heroic frontline worker will make a difference.”