Being a councilperson is hard, thankless work. You spend countless hours attending community meetings and events, sitting on joint agency boards, traveling to far-off conferences, and setting policy for dear old Claremont. After a hard day at City Hall and elsewhere, you really need a break.
Here's a suggestion: Run over to PianoPiano, the new piano bar at Foothill and Indian Hill Blvds., with some of your trusted staff and blow off some steam by partying hearty.
That's apparently just what some of our councilmembers did back on December 19th. Turns out PianoPiano has a Facebook page where they the post photos they take each night showing their customers. The PianoPiano photo album for December 19th carries the title "City of Claremont in the House!"
The PianoPiano Facebook page has a couple interesting photos, including one that captures a particularly "happy" City Manager Jeff Parker, perhaps basking in the knowledge that he'd received a 3% raise, bringing his annual salary to $211,000, as well as performance bonus equal to 4% of his salary. That's equal to about $15,000 in salary and bonus combined. All the more reason to hoist a cold one and toast the gods of municipal finance.
UPDATED, 7:15AM: As the Daily Bulletin reports, these details came to light at the most recent City Council meeting on Tuesday, January 13th. To be fair, Parker did voluntarily place a 90-day freeze on his 3% cost-of-living increase. He is, however, taking that bonus - worth $8,000 - to the bank.
In addition, Claremont Courier reporter and blogger Tony Krickl has a post about the council's 3-2 vote approving Parker's pay. Krickl writes:
Corey Calaycay did not support a bonus or the COLA increase.
Peter Yao only supported the cost of living increase but felt a bonus was not a responsible move right now.
“We put together a budget just a few months ago, 6 months ago, and we're not meeting the budget in terms of revenue coming in,” Yao said. “... I voted against [the bonus] simply because of the fact that I don't have money in the budget and I don't know where that money is coming from, and to spend money that I don't have isn't part of my job.”
Ellen Taylor, Linda Elderkin and Sam Pedroza weren’t so concerned about spending money that’s not available and voted in favor of the increase.
One might think, as a couple of speakers at the meeting touched on, that in the toughest economic times since the Great Depression, that the city council would put some added emphasis on fiscal prudence.
Nobody’s doubting Parker’s performance over the past year (save for a certain bulldozing incident), but when businesses are closing, auto sales are tanking, and city jobs and services might be threatened, the city should probably tuck away every dollar it has.
Here's the 12/19/08 PianoPiano photo:
Left to Right: Councilmember Corey Calaycay,Councilmember Sam Pedroza,
City Manager Jeff Parker, unidentified party.
And then there was another photo that must have been taken later in the evening showing an inebriated Sam Pedroza and company enjoying the evening out, though Pedroza's fellow Councilmember Corey Calaycay and Assistant City Manager Tony Ramos don't look half as wasted as Mr. Sam. What were Calaycay and Ramos drinking, anyway, Shirley Temples?
Councilmember Sam Pedroza
2nd Row, Far Right: Assistant City Manager Tony Ramos
With these photos being posted on the Internet for all the world to see, you'd think our City would do like James Caan's Santino Corleone in "The Godfather" and grab that paparazzo's camera and smash it to bits.
Nonetheless, with all the problems facing Claremont - a precipitous drop in revenues, business failures and home foreclosures, potential staff cuts and/or layoffs, cuts in services, delays in capital projects, a possible CalPERS pension hit - you can see why the folks in City Hall might want to tie one on. It really is enough to drive one to drink.
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