No Longer Franciscans for Sure

In 2005, county Supervisor Bill Horn proposed that he and his four colleagues should get a 25 percent salary increase. They were, at the time, making $115,000. The raise would have boosted their salaries to $143,838.

The proposal caused a ruckus. And Horn, defending his proposal, made an infamous comment to the Union-Tribune‘s reporter, Daniel Chacon:

“Psst…Pam, what are you doing with your raise? I’m getting indoor plumbing for my farmhands.”

“It is true we are elected, but nobody who got elected took a vow of poverty,” he told the paper. “We’re not Franciscans.”

A real Franciscan monk took offense to that and actually showed up at the county to protest.

Needless to say, Horn and the supes pulled the proposal.

But they still got their raise — they only had to wait a bit.

Just recently, their pay jumped to $143,000 a year.

You see, the supes long ago tied their pay to that of Superior Court judges statewide. They passed a law that ensured they would be paid 80 percent of whatever judges earn. And since the state of California has been on a major campaign to raise the salaries of judges, well, let’s just say the supes hitched their cart to the right horse.

Judges statewide now earn $178,789 after a recent 4.16 percent increase went into effect, which was retroactively applied back to July.

Incidentally, according to the Los Angeles Daily News, LA Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s pay is also tied to the judges’ salaries — he gets 20 percent more than whatever judges make. But he along with the L.A. city controller and four City Council members are rejecting the latest raise.

City Council members’ salaries in L.A. are equal to judges: $178,789 a year.

That’s about $100,000 more than San Diego City Council members.