Maybe the Annapolis aldermen shouldn't have told a salary review commission that they didn't seek public office for the money.
The commission took the aldermen at their word and is recommending big pay cuts for the City Council and mayor.
It suggests cutting the mayor's salary from $52,000 to $40,000 and eliminating the post's $4,000 expense account. It also proposes reducing the aldermen's pay from $8,500 to $5,000 a year, beginning in 1997.
The commission, made up of former city aldermen, said the cuts are intended to reflect voters' desire for less government spending.
Needless to say, the sitting aldermen are not thrilled with the recommendations. Some believe their salaries already are too low, and have requested secretarial help and office space. They are even more worried about the recommendation to cut the mayor's salary, which might not be too surprising given that several aldermen have mayoral ambitions.
The City Council has good reason to reject cuts to the aldermen's salaries.
According to the Maryland Municipal League, the $8,500 paid to the aldermen is comparable to the salaries paid to council members in other Maryland cities of Annapolis' size. The aldermen say they spend 20 to 40 hours a week in meetings and helping their constituents, which means they receive on average of about $5.10 an hour, or a nickel less than what President Clinton is proposing for the minimum wage.
Annapolis Mayor Alfred A. Hopkins, on the other hand, is the second-highest paid mayor in the state.
He oversees a city of 32,000 people and receives only $8,000 a year less than the mayor of Baltimore, who must wrestle with the urban ills of a metropolis of 736,000 residents. Mr. Hopkins' salary is six times that of the mayor of Rockville and $7,000 more than the mayor of Frederick, both larger than the state's capital city.
Cutting the mayor's salary won't make much of a dent in Annapolis' $40 million budget, but it would bring the mayor's pay in line with that of other mayors in Maryland.
The City Council probably won't cut the mayor's pay, but we think the salary review commission was right on that score.