Rescission of pay raises in Lordstown is proper

The five members of Lordstown Village Council who voted against raising the pay of 32 full-time and about 100 part-time employees can rest assured that they made the right decision — given the latest national unemployment figures and the fact that the economic turmoil of the past two years will not end any time soon.

Governments at all levels depend on taxes paid by people who work. A jobless rate of more than 10 percent — it’s higher in Ohio and even higher in the Mahoning Valley — means a weak revenue stream for the public sector.

Saying that Lordstown Village has the money to cover a 35-cent-an-hour increase proposed by Mayor Michael Chaffee last week or the 3 percent raises approved by the previous city council on Dec. 30 is to ignore the economic realities of 2010.

Betting on General Motors’ Lordstown assembly plant and the start of production of the highly anticipated Chevrolet Cruze is bad public policy. While we, like most Mahoning Valley residents, are confident that the Cruze will be a top seller for GM in the compact car class, the employment levels at the plant cannot be the basis for any government to go on a spending spree. There are too many economic unknowns.

In addition to which, giving any public employee in the Valley a pay raise in the midst of the recession suggests a blind spot that merely adds to the public’s skepticism of government.

While Mayor Chaffee may take exception to the contention, as expressed by village resident Ron Brown, that workers should be “elated” to have jobs, even with a wage freeze, there is a perception that public sector workers are out of touch with reality. For the past several years, the private sector has seen wages stagnate, pensions freeze and job security become a roll of the dice. Those lucky enough to have work are paying more for health insurance coverage and have even had their hours cut.

Sewer system

The idea of a government employee getting a raise in this economy is almost laughable. But what was taking place in Lordstown wasn’t a laughing matter — especially since the village must deal with legal and mechanical problems associated with a large sewer system being built on the east side.

As Councilman Arno Hill put it last Friday when the pay raises were rescinded, “Nobody knows where our sewer project is. It’s a year overdue and over budget. I know our employees had nothing to do with [that], but we need to be fiscally responsible.”

Mayor Chaffee, in justifying the raises, said that village Clerk Judith Hall had certified the money is in the budget and he challenged the no votes of the two new members of council on the grounds that they did not know as much about the operating budget as Hall. But as Councilman John McCarthy noted, he has 26 years of business-management experience and that the sewer project, which could cost $10 million, must be addressed first.

“In the worst-case scenario, we could have to dig up the sewer and rebuild it,” McCarthy said.

While no two communities in the Mahoning Valley are alike, the economic recession is a common denominator.

Therefore, an observation from Paul Marshall, chairman of the state fiscal commission overseeing the city of Campbell’s finances, pertaining to the number of major employers who have left the city is worth noting:

“Only people working pay income taxes.” And an increasing number of people in the Mahoning Valley aren’t working.

Lordstown’s city council members are to be commended for rescinding the pay raises.