By Shelby Stewart-Soldan
Staff Writer
Ortonville — During the regular Monday night meeting, the Ortonville Village Council voted a change in pay for council members and the village president.
The motion to change the rate of pay from $55 per meeting for trustees and $75 per meeting for the village president to $800 annually for trustees and $1,000 annually for the village president was voted down, 5-2, with council members Melanie Nivelt and Tony Randazzo voting for the change.
The proposal was brought forward by Nivelt to save the village money on payroll. Currently, council members have the option to deny pay if they choose. Council members are paid per regular meeting, special meeting, as well as committee meetings and workshops.
“When I was on Heritage, Wayfinding, Personnel, Planning and village council, all at the same time, I would have been bringing in thousands of dollars of tax-payer dollars,” said Nivelt. “I don’t feel that would be correct. The way it’s set up right now, anybody could do that. I just chose not to. I’m trying to stop abuse in the future, because not everybody will do that. I did not elect to get paid for what I did on Heritage and Wayfinding. I did that for free.”
A second option was also presented to lower the pay for anything that was not a regularly scheduled meeting to $35 per meeting, but the motion went unsupported.
“It’s, to me, fixing something that isn’t broken. I believe that the council members can and should receive a stipend to attend official meetings, and every government agency offers it,” said village president Ken Quisenberry. “Because people are giving up things, and they may have to hire a baby sitter or they may have to pay certain expenses. Nobody is on the council to make money. I think the pay rate is not too high, not too low.”
Other council members also took issue with changing to a yearly rate instead of a per-meeting rate, as there are council members that are on more committees than others. Currently, the budget for meeting pay is $8,000.
“Changing it from pay per meeting, to a flat rate, it can in some cases disincentive people from making the meetings or doing those committee meetings,” said council member Larry Hayden. “I don’t think it’s fair that someone who puts in a lot of effort and attends meetings faithfully gets their pay cut.”