LYNN — The City Council voted to schedule a public hearing regarding the fiscal year 2025 budget, which includes a proposal to increase councilors’ wages by $7,500 a year, on June 11.
This ordinance would also increase the annual salary of members of the School Committee by $7,250.
After the public weighs in, the council will take a vote on the salaries of councilors and committee members.
Mayor Jared Nicholson declined the opportunity to receive a raise as well, Councilor-at-Large Brian LaPierre said.
Currently, councilors make $25,000 a year while School Committee members make $9,000. If the increase is improved, councilors and committee members would make $32,500 and $16,250, respectively, each year starting in 2027.
If this motion passes, the raise for city councilors would not take effect until after the next election cycle.
“All of us who are taking a vote upon the raise have to run for reelection,” LaPierre said in an interview with The Item.
The $7,500 raise would be broken up over two consecutive fiscal years. In the FY26 budget, councilors would receive $3,750 of the raise, and the remaining $3,750 for FY27. The allocations would be spread out, with a raise of $312.50 each month.
“I think we’ve kind of designed this in a smart way that is not lucrative by any means,” LaPierre said.
The proposed raises will not affect the FY25 budget that Nicholson will propose on June 11.
LaPierre said that councilors work a “part-time job with full-time hours.” He added that the council wanted to create “some balance and symmetry” between the salaries of councilors and School Committee members.
“There’s no reason why the councilors should get paid $25,000 right now, and the School Committee just $9,000,” he said. “We felt that was out of balance and it doesn’t reflect the work that the School Committee is doing on a regular basis.”
LaPierre said this increase would align with the raises of other municipal workers in the city.
The proposed raises are based on the last 10 years of the average municipal workers’ collective bargaining agreements, LaPierre said.
“Our librarians, our DPW workers, our police, our fire, our City Hall personnel have all received raises over the past decade,” he said.
LaPierre said that councilors and School Committee members have not received a raise in that time.
“I would say that it’s a modest pay increase based upon the work that a very evolving job entails now in the City of Lynn,” LaPierre said.
Because councilors are paid monthly, LaPierre said they “are paid approximately $15.50 per hour for the amount of hours they scheduled us in to work per month.”
“It’s just not council meetings per se. There are a lot of community events that we attend on behalf of the city. We’re constantly representing the city,” LaPierre said.
“There is now no real downtime to our respective schedules because of social media, messaging, and events that are scheduled at all hours,” he added.
LaPierre said that councilors handle a significant amount of constituent services, and that as a result, their phones are constantly ringing.
He said it is the council’s hope that the raise will attract new candidates to run for public office.
“We want to do it all transparently,” LaPierre added.
