THE CHICAGO WAY: Not All Furloughs Are Equal

See how many furlough days the Mayor and Aldermen took last year

Chicago aldermen often insist that their job is so demanding that they never really get a day’s rest. Now, that assertion is being confirmed by an official policy of Mayor Richard M. Daley’s administration.

The mayor and most members of the City Council — but far from all — are doing what the rest of the city’s work force was made to do during the current budget crisis, taking off as many as 15 unpaid days in 2009 and bracing for another 24 unpaid days this year.

But even the elected leaders taking furlough days are not feeling the pain of the recession as deeply as rank-and-file workers. That is because the Daley administration gives aldermen a break by deducting their furlough days from a 365-day schedule. Clout pays off again.

Here is how the math works: If, for example, you are a snowplow driver, tree trimmer, secretary or other typical city worker, you have 261 work days a year. So each furlough day translates into a deduction of 1/261st from your yearly wages. Twenty-four unpaid days works out to a 9.2 percent pay cut.

The mayor, the clerk, the treasurer and Council members, however, give up 1/365th of their annual salary for each furlough day. So an elected official would be subject to only a 6.6 percent salary cut.

While most city workers must take the furlough days, the elected officials are not required to do so. To show solidarity with the workers, 28 of the 50 aldermen took at least 15 furlough days and Mayor Daley took 16 in 2009, city records show. The sacrifices saved the city about $205,000.

Richard Mell, the 33rd Ward alderman and father-in-law of former Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich, led the way with 21 furlough days.

“My goal is not to get a big pat on the back,” said Mr. Mell, who became wealthy as owner of a spring factory.

The days that aldermen most frequently claimed they were on furlough were holidays.

Three aldermen — Frank Olivo (13th), JoAnn Thompson (16th) and Brendan Reilly (42nd) — took no furlough days last year. Mr. Olivo and Ms. Thompson did not return calls, but Mr. Reilly promised to take 24 furlough days in 2010. He said he was among the few aldermen who declined a raise.

Aldermanic salaries are tied to the local Consumer Price Index, so when the index fell 3.5 percent last year, aldermen were in line for a pay cut, to $106,644.

But 38 council members averted that fate, said Pete Scales, a city budget office spokesman. They simply submitted an affidavit to the city indicating that they still want to be paid the higher annual wage of more than $110,000.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 4th, 2010 at 10:23 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.