The supervisor’s salary has been pegged at $35,000 a year since before Greg Helsmoortel, the six-term incumbent Myers mauled in the November elections, took office.
Is it too little to run a four-million-dollar operation? Maybe. But supervisors are notoriously underpaid in this area. In any event, if Myers pursues this salary drive, she’ll need at least two more votes on the town board, and that would appear unlikely.
Politicians are extremely circumspect about their salaries. By law, state legislators can grant themselves increases only in the year in which they are elected. Sounds like open government, but they usually vote raises after the elections. Come to think of it, state legislators, currently paid a $79,500 base salary, haven’t had a raise since 1999.
At the same time, county legislators have been struggling by with $10,000 annual salaries since 1999. Some may be arguing that with 23 doing the work (?) of 33 next year, a small increase might be in order. The county executive, after freezing the salaries of his management staff for the last four budgets, will not be receptive.
Madam chairman
To the surprise (now) of almost no one, Rochester’s Terry Bernardo was selected Ulster legislature chairwoman by majority Republicans at a caucus in Kingston on Monday night.
Despite initial opposition from Ulster’s Jim Maloney, the vote was announced as unanimous. For Madam Chairwoman’s sake, it had better stay that way. It takes a majority of the legislature to elect a chair; Republicans have exactly 12 of 23. If the GOP caucus has second thoughts, her only hope would be to go to the Democrats, and that could get ugly.
Maloney, the Ulster town assessor, abandoned his quest for legislature chairman, though he could wind up as vice chairman. Other than lacking the votes, a key ingredient, it seems the good burghers of Ulster weren’t all that keen on their assessor spending half his days — at the least — at the county office building.
With Maloney sidelined, Bernardo, with lots of muscle from “daddy” — husband and Independence Party boss Len Bernardo — will become the legislature’s first woman chairman.
Kingston bits
City Democratic Chairman Frank Cardinale got a nice send-off last Friday night marking more than 20 years as Kingston American Legion baseball manager. About 150 people, including members of Cardinale’s teams from three decades, attended a testimonial dinner at Hillside Manor. Major League Baseball official historian John Thorn, formerly of Saugerties and now of Catskill, was guest speaker.
