We recently submitted a round of public records requests asking for salary information on both County and City leaders from FY 2007 through the present.
The result is the attached chart, which plots the salaries of the County Judge, County Commissioners, Mayor of El Paso, and City Representatives over a 17-year period.
In the current fiscal year, the County Judge, who votes for his own compensation, earns 71% more than the Mayor of El Paso, whose salary has been pegged to average household income since FY 2020.
Meanwhile, County Commissioners earn 124% more than El Paso City Representatives–in spite of the fact that the current County budget is about $756 million while the City budget exceeds $1.3 billion.
Our graph shows that elected City leaders earned very modest compensation until FY 2020-2024, when their salaries rose sharply until they approximately doubled.
By contrast, elected County leaders voted themselves double-digit salary hikes for FY 2017, 2020, and 2024.
With the exception of Commissioner Iliana Holguin, who opposed the latest salary hike, the Commissioners Court seems to imagine itself as a body of elite corporate administrators who deserve to earn executive salaries even though no particular academic or professional qualifications are required for their jobs.
The County Judge now earns triple the median household income in El Paso.
And let us remember that not only has the County just voted to raise our County property tax to the highest level permitted by law without voter authorization, but they have made known their intention to issue up to $500,000,000 in new bonds, including $150 million in certificates of obligation; and this comes on the heels of the $100 million in certificates of obligation and tax anticipation notes they voted for one year ago.
And here is the clincher. We are now hearing about a potential plan to construct a new UMC hospital on the Eastside on County land, and that would necessitate issuing upwards of a quarter-billion dollars in additional bonds, raising our property tax even higher.
Financially, the County has flown off the rails!
We have said it before and will say it again. Support Libertarian Ryan Woodcraft for County Precinct 1!