Public employees not overpaid

For San Diego's North County Times

Ever since a handful of elected officials in a small town in Los Angeles County were caught helping themselves to astronomical salaries at taxpayer expense, the press has declared open season on public employees.

A recent example is an article appearing in this newspaper a couple of weeks ago ("Salaries up for county employees," Nov. 7). The lead-in claimed, "Base pay for some increased by 31 percent from 2007 to '09." This may have been an eye-catching introduction to a front page story, but it fell well short of the truth.

The increase was not in base pay. It was in the share of county employees earning more than $100,000 after nearly 600 temporary and student jobs had been eliminated. With 18,700 employees, a more accurate headline would be, "Ninety-five percent of county employees make less than $100K."

Here's a comparison of the county's public employee pay with the wages of workers in the total work force, as reported by the California Employment Development Department.

The average salary of the county's 2,700 chief executive officers is $201,000. That's .2 percent of the total work force. The 25 public employees who earn more than $200,000 a year represent .1 percent of the taxpayer-funded work force.

The county's chief administrative officer's base pay is $296,000. He's the CEO of an organization with a $5 billion budget that serves 3 million residents, exceeding the population of 20 states.

In comparison, the San Diego Business Journal reports the highest-paid banking executive in the county, PacWest CEO Matt Wagner, earned a base pay last year of $750,000, with a bonus of $562,000, for total compensation amounting to $1.5 million. The bank's total assets are $5.2 billion. By that measure, I'd say we're getting a bargain for our county's top leadership.

What about those other public employees earning at least $100,000?

The average salary of the county's 2,000 physicians and surgeons is $219,000. The highest-paid medical practitioner on the public payroll is a psychiatrist earning $216,000.

San Diego County's 6,000 attorneys earn an average of $145,000. Public defender attorneys have salaries ranging from $120,000 to $137,000.

This small sample, comparing the pay of jobs requiring specialized skills, education and training, suggests public employees are paid somewhat less than their private-sector counterparts.

There are 128,000 waiters, waitresses, janitors, maids, housekeepers, cashiers and retail salespersons in the private sector who earn annual pay ranging on average from $21,000 to $26,000. That's why the $37,000 median wage of the county's work force is well below the $60,000 average of the more highly skilled, trained and educated workers on the county payroll.

It's time to cool the rhetoric about overpaid public employees.

Tea Party has little influence in California

For the North County Times, San Diego

From the looks of Tuesday's election results, it appears the steadily dwindling attendance at Oceanside tea party events over the last year was a pretty good indicator of the movement's lack of influence on local politics.

The 2009 Tax Day rally, featuring a march to the pier from the city center to toss bags of sand disguised as tea into the surf, attracted some 3,000 participants, according to police reports. This year's rally attracted less than half that number. And the number of empty seats seen in photos of last month's get-out-the-vote, four-hour speech fest revealed no more than about 300 to 400 in attendance throughout the afternoon.

While national tea partiers celebrated their role in helping Republicans take over the House of Representatives on Tuesday evening, the signs carried by Oceanside tea party members, promising an extreme make-over of California politics Nov. 2, resulted in the re-election of Sen. Barbara Boxer and the resurrection of Gov. Jerry Brown. The self-proclaimed tea party candidate for governor, Chelene Nightingale, whose campaign was promoted by a huge sign on a truck circling the amphitheater and a fellow in a grim reaper costume wandering through the crowd, attracted less than 2 percent of the vote.

Election results for local candidates were remarkably unsurprising, given the promises of change made by tea party leaders. County Supervisor Bill Horn was re-elected, but that may have had more to do with the $340,000 he spent on his campaign, compared to Steve Gronke's $39,000 investment, than his high-profile courting of tea partiers, who did not reciprocate by endorsing him. All local state legislator incumbents were re-elected. So much for the promise of change in Sacramento. And from their attack-mode campaign rhetoric, we're unlikely to hear how our two re-elected Congressmen will play well with others from across the aisle in Washington.

The results on the propositions were equally unsurprising. Fear of unions continues to run rampant with the passing of propositions A and G. Tea party fears of taxes and fees led to the defeat of Prop 21, and a general fear of politicians to the defeat of Prop. 27, which would have returned redistricting to the Legislature. Despite the tea party joining with big oil to urge passage of Prop. 23 to suspend the Global Warming Solutions Act, Californians showed their true color is green and handily defeated it. Voters expressed their desire to have state budgets passed on time by approving Prop 25.

Today's tea partiers, unlike those of yore, live in a democracy that gives them the right to vote and encourages the political activism on display at anti-tax rallies at facilities built with their tax dollars, like the Oceanside Pier Amphitheater. Tuesday's election results show they have far more influence east of Nevada.

Richard Riehl writes from Carlsbad. Contact him at fogcutter1@yahoo.com.