CAMBRIDGE — When this city’s next manager takes over this summer, he will wade into a long, sticky controversy over the walloping salary that the post commands.
Richard C. Rossi, a longtime deputy city manager, signed a three-year contract that guarantees a $330,000 annual salary, by far the highest paid to a Massachusetts municipal manager and nearly twice that of Mayor Thomas M. Menino of Boston.
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Cambridge...Cantabridgians...Enormous self regard....
Most people in Cambridge are not happy about the City Manager getting over double Deval's salary.
Our city government is very corporate in the sense that the firefighters, police, teachers, and workers are putting in lots of work, but there's a board of directors (City Council & School Committee) that rather shamelessly boosts the pay of a few at the top (the City Manager & School Superintendent) and then tells the people who actually put out the fires, stop the violence, collect the trash, and teach the kids: "We don't have enough in the budget for everything we want..."
Members of our School Committee get a stipend that's bigger than what Education paraprofessionals make after showing up every day and helping the kids with the toughest disadvantages.
You'd think that having started out collecting trash Rossi would respect the people on the bottom of the pyramid as the ones who do the real work of making Cambridge a great place to live and work. But his attitude seems to be more like "it's good to be the king."
There is no need for the City of Cambridge to conduct a "search" when the best candidate has over thirty years experience and probably knows the city better than most residents.
right. no need for a search and no need for salary sanity. Cambridge paying more for its mayor than Boston and double what the Governor of the Commonwealth is paid?? sounds like a small city clique that has picked up Harvard-MIT contempt for the "little people" who live in a real world where we pay taxes and tuition for this "expertise".
Wow. 330 large.
The taxpayers are getting what they deserve. They are responsible for putting the idiots in office that approved this heist. And they sit by while the assurances of actually having an independent search were ignored.
The executive compensation craziness consultants strike again. Maybe their level of antipsychotic meds needs adjustment.
Hmm. 330 simoleans divided by 105,000 Cantabrigians = ...
The city manager's salary should have been re-set to what the market pays for that position in a comparable city. The fact that Healy served in the position for thirty years is not typical. The city council shouldn't have just picked up where it left off with Healy's compensation.
That said, last week people were enraged because Tom May, NStar/Northeast Utilities CEO, received $8 million in compensation. Obviously $330,000 pales in comparison. As CEO of Cambridge I'd argue that if his experience and ability made him the best person to take over the job than he should be paid a good chunk of change. As they say, you get what you pay for.
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The best hiring standard is demonstrated ability to do the job. The outgoing City Manager assembled a tremendous financial team under him, focused on minimizing expenses and maximizing revenue. Richard Rossi learned for 32 years under this outgoing City Manager. So, the Cambridge City Council accurately figured Rossi was the best person available who’s demonstrated an ability to keep Cambridge running as a healthy Cash Cow. The future successor to Rossi should be paid likewise, if s/he can keep the City of Cambridge’s “prized bond ratings and revenue-generating property taxes, ” and “high marks’ from residents. Oh, there is one factual error in this article, which said the Manager appoints heads of departments and commissions --that’s not the complete truth. The Cambridge City Manager directly appoints EVERYBODY within the City Government except for employees of the City Council, the School Department, the City Clerk’s Office, and the City Auditor’s Office. This Manager position is therefore pretty unique, and the Manager should be paid what the market will bear.
doesnt sound like a City of Cambridge employee/flunky too much, heh?
No. I am not a City employee. But I have been an observer of Cambridge City Government for some time. I want people to know most of us in Cambridge think that Rossi's a good choice and that the salary's OK. Basic politics id local, right? So let Cantibrigians decide what's appropriate to pay their City Manager. Frankly, it's a tough job, so for his own sake, I hope Rossi does three years as Manager and then retires.
Have I got this right? Rossi was making $287,000 as Deputy City Manager? How much does the Assistant City Manager make? And the Deputy Assistant City Manager? And the Assistant to the Deputy Assistant Deputy City Manager? It's amazing what those silly Cambridge lefties will put up with.
I'm amazed that, even as a deputy city manager, this dude still made more than anyone else in the Globe chart. Clearly he wasn't going to take a pay cut to become City Manager. I'd say Cambridge needs to take a hard look at what they pay, and how yearly salary increases work in the long term. Or maybe the model where the highest paid person is limited to making 5x (or some appropriate number) what the lowest paid person makes. And should be Total Compensation, not just salary.
If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys.
Cambridge gets value for money. Do the math:
http://cambridgeville.wordpress.com/tag/cambridge-ma-property-taxes/
CambridgevilleLara Gordon's News & Insight for the Cambridge/Somerville Real Estate Market
Happy New… Taxes! January 2, 2013Don’t worry — this has nothing to do with the “fiscal cliff” that we’re all so sick of hearing about… simply a posting of our residential property tax rates for 2013. Numbers reflect rate per $1,000 of a home’s assessed value.
CAMBRIDGE — $8.66 with a residential exemption savings of $1,755.37 (If you own a home in Cambridge, say YEEHAW! because our taxes are low, low, low thanks to our #1 tax payer, MIT, as well as all of the various pharma and tech companies based here.)
Important: if you bought a home in Cambridge last year and haven’t already done so, don’t forget to file your residential exemption application no later than January 20, 2013!
SOMERVILLE — $13.42 with a residential exemption savings of $1,885.97
Important: if you bought a home in Somerville last year and haven’t already done so, don’t forget to file your residential exemption application no later than April 1, 2013!
And here’s how Cambridge & Somerville’s taxes compare to other local cities/towns’ 2013 rates:
But wouldn't a monkey still get the same $$$ from MIT, the pharma and tech companies? Clearly, as the article states, the low tax rate is mostly due to revenue that has nothing to do to the effectiveness of the City Manager. MIT is not packing up and moving to Watertown any time soon. $363K in salary plus bennies is very high, I suspect the City Manager of Worcester could do this job just as well for $200K.
so, how many City Hall flunkies were hard at work this morning submitting comments justifying this ?
I just dont get the lead sentence ... hasnt his contract been signed, his salary fixed and this is a done deal?? The Harvard and MIT fat cats certainly dont have any problem with this guy earning less than they do and I would confidently predict that this is a one story event. This City Manager will enjoy all the perks and his next contract will be higher. Sounds like a pretty closed shop there. Unless the voters get rid of at least half of their representatives, this story will be the last we hear.
Well, if this doesn't demonstrate the City of Cambridge's commitment to offering to its employees a "living wage" I don't know what would.
My favorite quote was Counsellor Kelley's: "We hope the next city manager will not have the same expectations to make the same amount.” All that's missing is a laugh-track.
One of the things that should have been part of a search would have been an examination of where we want to go as a city. At some point we will have built on every square inch, and the Healy model of infinite growth that fuels our finances will hit a brick wall. We have infrastructure issues right now with public transit, such as whether the Red Line can accommodate the stated goal of doubling the density of Kendall Square and its extension to Central Square to the west (and beyond?), along with all the development at Alewife, and the same question with respect to whether the yet-to-be-extended Green Line can accommodate NorthPoint, the to-be-former courthouse and whatever else they try to shoehorn into that part of East Cambridge. Cambridge talks a good game, but we are allergic to actually looking at where we are and where we're going.
Too many voters can't or don't put in the effort to see what their elected officials are actually doing for all the money we pay them, so, if they even vote at all in odd-numbered years, they're limited to judging people by the pap they spew at election time. I was one of those people for much too long, and it was quite the eye-opener when I started watching city council, school committee, planning board and board of zoning appeal meetings. My hope is that more people will start paying attention and voting accordingly as neighborhood after neighborhood becomes part of the money machine, and people suffer the direct effects of the building mania.
Thank you for paricipating in Cambridge public affairs. I mean it. But here's how it works in Cambridge: the Cambridge City Councillors are the visionaries and the Cambrisge City Manager is the bean-counter-in-chief. The Cambridge City Manager can't be a visionary because s/he works for the visionary Councillors, and there might be a clash of visions that the City Manager would lose. So the City Manager minimizes expenses, maximizes revenues, and generally oversees hiring and the provision of day-to-day city services. That is enough of a job, frankly. Unlike Boston, in Cambridge the chief municipal executive Manager actually works for the City Council. So the Council decides where the City is going, and the Manager makes sure the money is there to fund that trip.
Visionaries? You have obviously never seen the Cambridge City Council in action. Visionaries? Visionaries? Bob Healy works for them? I think we need the laugh track from a previous comment.
As to minimizing expenses, you seem to have forgotten about the Monteiro, Stamper and Wong cases, not to mention the six other cases the manager refuses to tell us anything about, not even their names.
And not even a Devl hire
Geez, we made it hours before a troll crawled over here from the Herald.
The salaries paid to corporate executives, as determined by boards, is but one generator of excessive disparities of income -- about the worst the country -- has known in several generations -- and their accompanying economic and social ills. Given the productivity of labor, a more just distribution would reduce both poverty and waste. Government, and especially local government has become one chief agents in the transfer of wealth from the less to the more affluent. It therefore makes little sense to view Democratic Party controlled government as 'regulatory,' limiting the economic imbalances that are destructive to the common good, when it is an active defender of big money and debt.
Elie Yarden, Green-Rainbow Party, Cambridge
Should be another big fat pension for the taxpayers to fund which is already in debt by a billion or so-but let's just keep adding to it!
I gotta say -- $330K-a-year is a bit much. I'm sure he works hard, and Cambridge is a great place and should have a well-compensated leader. But $330K is more than well-compensated. It's ridiculous.
the salary is "too damn high" ...
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