Zanesville City Leaders Move Toward Pay Raises

ZANESVILLE, Ohio — Zanesville City Council is moving toward ratifying pay raises for themselves and some city office holders for the next term to begin January 1, 2020.

Ordinance 19-108, which passed on first reading by City Council Monday night, gives a roughly 2.6% pay increase to the City Auditor, Treasurer, Council Members, Council President, Law Director & Mayor.

“I asked the budget & Finance Director to take a look at what other cities were paying their elected officials and she did that, providing the Ways & Means Committee earlier tonight those figures and also looked then at the Cost of Living [Adjustment] rates and included that, then too.” says Zanesville City Council President Dan Vincent.

Though the ordinance passed its first reading, Vincent tells WHIZ News each reading of an ordinance gets its own vote, which he says is unique mostly to Zanesville.

“With Ohio Revised Code, this will need to be passed and signed in legislation before the election. With that, I think it was set up so people could not get elected into office and then vote themselves a big raise or decrease someone’s raise, say, if they didn’t like another elected official that they could decrease their salary to force them out,” he added.

State law states, “the salary of any officer of a city shall not be increased or diminished during the term for which he was elected or appointed.”