Oregon Legislator Salary Increase: SB 1566 Would Have Pushed Annual Average Legislator Funding From ALL Sources As High as $208K.

On Monday three Oregon legislators said they would be leaving after this term because SB 1566, which would have doubled their base salaries, was not moving forward.

It certainly will be a loss to not have the experience of these members in the upcoming legislative assembly.

The primary problem that I saw with the legislation is that it provided a near doubling in salaries without requiring any additional disclosures or restrictions. 

Members could continue to work second jobs, employ relatives, and use campaign funds with no additional disclosures required. 

A-9 amendment, not subject to a public hearing, boosted pay by another $6,000 by switching the wage index used and also likely did not help. 

Base Salary is Only A Portion of the Total Annual Funding Available to Individual Legislators.

As the graphic from the House Members Guidebook indicates base salary is only ONE source of funding controlled by legislators. 

There is no central source I have found where all of these sources of funding can be located for an individual member. These are my best estimates of the relevant amounts.

Base salary: 

Current, $33,852. That's an increase of 39.8% from the $23,052 in base salary in 2015. 

Proposed  $63,464 1st Year (Effective July 1, 2022, with another increase scheduled for Jan 1, 2023 which would likely boost past $65,000). Plus annual average child care allowance of $4,500 for members with children less than 13. That's an initial increase of $29,612/87% without the child care, or $34,112 /101% with the child care allowance. 

Per diem $155 daily (adjusted annually, no voucher required).

Office allowance varies by district size from $450-$1,025 when out of session. (2019 update)

Tax exempt value of per diem and office allowance (I used 5% for state income tax and 15% for federal income tax for members with a residence more than 50 miles from the state capitol building).

Staff salary and expense account. $101,061 average annually (As reported in the Amended Rules of the Senate 2021). [Additional expenses may be approved over and above the allowance, but I could not find any source for that information; I could also not find a source of information for use of these funds to pay for relatives].   

Missing: I could not find any way to extract the use of campaign funds for office expenses. (A 2019 Oregonian story HERE shows how campaign funds were used by some legislators including paying of relatives and for office expenses).

So....At Current Base Salary the Range of Average Annual Total Funding Controlled by Members--$167K to $174K. 

Using the current base salary the lowest total funding controlled by a member I calculate at $166,491 and the highest at $174,006.

And.....With Proposed Base Salary Increase, Range of Average Annual Total Funding Controlled by Members-$196K to $208K. 

Using the proposed salary I calculate the lowest total funding controlled by a member at $196,103 and the highest (for members claiming the child care allowance) at $208,118

The table below shows a side by side comparison of the low and high total funding available to legislators using the current and proposed base salaries

Originally created and posted on the Oregon Housing Blog.