Supes agree job is tough

By Tim Hearden

July 10, 2000 Web posted at: 10:55 AM EDT (1455 GMT)

SHASTA COUNTY, California (Redding Record Searchlight) -- Though they disagreed recently over whether they deserved a pay raise, Shasta County supervisors agree on at least one thing.

They all say they work hard for their money.

Supervisors Trish Clarke, Molly Wilson, Glenn Hawes, Irwin Fust and David Kehoe all contend they work well over 40 hours a week serving their constituents and say the public sometimes underestimates how much work they do.

"There's been some indication that supervisors do not commit themselves full time," said Clarke, who represents the Anderson area. "I can only speak for myself, but it is a full-time job for me."

The workload for the Board of Supervisors served as a backdrop as board members considered, and then adopted June 27, salary increases for themselves in increments amounting to 10 percent over the next 30 months. Their monthly salaries will climb to $4,539, which adds up to $54,468 a year, by January 2003.

They will also move $758 in monthly travel and business stipends to their base salaries as of September. Prior to the vote, their base salary was $3,386 a month.

The board approved the pay raises by a 3-2 vote, with Fust and Kehoe dissenting. Fust and Kehoe later announced intentions to give up their portions of the pay raises, Fust to the Good News Rescue Mission and Kehoe back to the county.

Shortly before the vote, 79-year-old George Brkich of Anderson argued against the pay hikes by saying he and others consider the supervisor positions to be part-time jobs. However, in defending their decision later that week, Clarke, Hawes and Wilson said they work more than full time at being supervisors and that board members hadn't received raises since 1997. "Don't forget, a supervisor's pay is about half of what the average department head makes," said Hawes, whose district is in eastern Shasta County. "Look at what (County Administrative Officer Doug) Latimer makes. Ours (the supervisors' wage) is about a third of what he makes."

Latimer's annual salary is $119,205.

County supervisors' job duties are spelled out in the California Government Code. While the code outlines how a supervisor is elected and focuses largely on such things as how meetings are conducted, it purposely avoids telling elected officials how many hours they must spend at their jobs, explained Elaine Kavanaugh, Shasta County's budget officer.

"They are elected to do a job," Kavanaugh said. "They're not elected to put in so many hours. They're elected to do a job."

However, Clarke said she knows all too well how many hours it takes to adequately serve her constituents. She closed her metal detector and recreation mining equipment business when she was elected to the board 10 years ago, and her life since then has been a seemingly endless stream of community meetings, phone calls from constituents and paperwork.

She's joined just about every community-based organization in southern Shasta County, from the Anderson and Cottonwood chambers of commerce to timber and cattle-ranchers' groups, because, "I'm a county supervisor and I need to know what those organizations are doing," she said.

Then there are the weekly agenda packets, which are usually inches thick. All the supervisors said they spend a large chunk of their weekends poring over each agenda item and developing questions to ask at Tuesday's meeting.

"We get a tremendous amount of mail every day," said Wilson, who serves northern Shasta County. "We can't possibly read everything, but we try to get the highlights."

Each supervisor also must serve on a host of other boards and committees that are, in one way or another, related to county business. Among Clarke's specialties has been her work with the Local Agency Formation Commission and its statewide advocacy group. For Kehoe, much time has been spent on a committee overseeing the distribution of Proposition 10 cigarette-tax money.

"I have always felt it has grown to a full-time job and citizens deserve that commitment," Clarke said. "People should be able to do this job and not have to have other employment."

Some board members, however, do have other jobs. Fust owns a printing shop in Redding. Hawes owns a ranch in eastern Shasta County. And Kehoe handles grants and agreements for the U.S. Forest Service in Redding.

But the supervisors said their jobs don't interfere with their service to constituents. "The Forest Service job is 40 hours, so I'm working 80 hours a week," Kehoe said.

"To me, the question is not whether it's a full-time or a part-time job," Kehoe said. "To me, the issue is compensation."

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