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Councilwoman Inez Dickens Gets $36,000 Pay Raise, Despite Lackluster Record

By Gustavo Solis | February 7, 2016 4:35pm
 Inez Dickens and her colleges in the city council gave themselves a $36,000 raise Friday. Their base salary will be $148,500.
Inez Dickens and her colleges in the city council gave themselves a $36,000 raise Friday. Their base salary will be $148,500.
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Facebook/Inez Dickens

HARLEM — Councilwoman Inez Dickens deserves a $36,000 raise because she pays for her constituents' funerals and groceries.

That is the justification she presented to a commission two days before City Council members gave themselves a 32 percent pay raise Friday.

“We’re on the street and therefore we get people who come into our offices when their children have been murdered and they have no insurance and we write the checks to help with burying them,” she said Wednesday at a public hearing.

“We get families that come in and we give them money out of our pockets in order for them to eat. I can personally give you a count of how often I have had to write checks.”

Her chief of staff did not respond to an email asking for that count.

In terms of legislative output, Dickens introduced one piece of legislation in 2015, records show. The only Council member who submitted fewer bills was The Bronx's Maria Del Carmen Arroyo, who resigned at the end of 2015.

In terms of how much money she brought to Harlem, Dickens distributed $1.1 million in discretionary funds to 150 organizations, records show. The numbers put her on par with her colleagues in the City Council.

An independent commission recommended raising council members’ base pay 23 percent — from $112,500 to $138,500. But elected officials instead raised their own salaries to $148,500 a year.

The extra money is to make up for new restrictions prohibiting members from earning outside income by getting a second job, according to the City Council.

However, that outside income ban only affects 10 percent of City Council members. All members are still able to receive "passive income" from book royalties, renting apartments or investments, according to the commission.

Before the vote, Dickens told the commission that she shouldn’t be “penalized” for choosing to become a “public servant.”

“I don’t feel I should be penalized on my salary because the last time I looked, we still pay the same rent,” she said Wednesday. “We have the same high cost of living as our constituents do.”

Median household income in Harlem was $36,112 in 2012

Financial disclosure forms from 2014 show the councilwoman has 50 percent ownership in four buildings in Harlem that are worth more than $2 million.