THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, August 28, 1994 TAG: 9408260272
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 07 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: On the Street
SOURCE: Bill Reed
LENGTH: Medium: 70 lines
They're at it again. Politicians, I mean.
They're raiding your wallets and pocketbooks like there's no tomorrow.
This time, it's the City Council, which voted 7-3 on Tuesday to continue paying the city's five constitutional officers car allowances amounting to $300 to $350 a month.
That's in addition to the $79,000 to $88,000 a year they already make.
Those getting the extra gravy in their paychecks are Sheriff Frank Drew, Treasurer John T. Atkinson, Commonwealth's Attorney Robert J. Humphreys, Clerk of Circuit Court Curtis Fruit and Commissioner of the Revenue Robert Vaughan.
The action was dubbed ``welfare for the wealthy'' by Councilman Robert K. Dean, who, with fellow council members Nancy K. Parker and Barbara M. Henley, voted against the stipend.
Vice Mayor William D. Sessoms, who suggested the allowance in the first place, said the constitutional officers are underpaid in comparison to similar office holders in cities of like - or nearly like - size.
Freshman Councilman William H. Harrison pointed out that the council had made a commitment to make the monthly payments and should not suddenly cut it off.
``If we take it away now, it would be a hardship,'' he said.
No one is saying these gents don't earn or deserve their pay, which - without the car allowances - is very handsome, indeed.
But, in general, Joe and Jane Lunch Pail together don't make $79,000 to $88,000 in a single year. And, it's for dern sure they don't get another $3,200 to $4,200 a year handed to them by their bosses to drive their family jalopies to and from work.
That kind of dough, along with the hefty salaries, usually is reserved for middle-level business executives, modestly successful lawyers and mid-level municipal administrators.
Those are the dudes and dudesses who drive the Beemers, the Mercedes, the Saabs and the Volvos. Those are the folks who sip dry white French wine out of long-stemmed glasses, vacation in Aspen every winter, send their kids to private schools, shell out a grand or more a month in home mortgage payments and have gardeners fluff up their flower beds.
Joe and Jane Lunch Pail, meanwhile, make do with modest wages, somewhere below $30,000 or $40,000 a year. Sometimes it's way below. If they're lucky, the Lunch Pails can keep their jobs on the midnight shift at local Naval Air Rework Facility and the local supermarket checkout counter so they can continue paying their bills, feeding their kids and buying a sixpack now and then.
Don't get me wrong. Joe and Jane and their 2.5 children don't feel sorry for themselves. Actually, they realize that they have a pretty good life.
They live in a modest three-bedroom house in Thalia, on which they are paying off a 30-year mortgage. They drive two late '80s-model American cars that need new tires and a tune-up, are hooked up to cable TV and they take their family out to the neighborhood eatery and a movie once a week on whatever is left over in the piggy bank. On Sundays, they take their children to church and drop a few bills in the collection plate.
Not a bad life, any way you look at it. But what ticks them off, what really scorches their shorts more than just about anything, except maybe summer vacations with know-it-all, tightwad-in-laws, is the blase manner in which elected officials blow their hard-earned tax money.
And paying $300 to $350 a month car allowances to guys who pull down 79 to 88 Gs a year is a prime example.
KEYWORDS: CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICERS ALLOWANCES BENEFITS by CNB