Kulongoski sees the light on salaries

Finally someone acknowledges that boosting salaries for public employees when the economy is floundering feels like a slap to the face of the taxpayers who foot the bill.

Or like a hand clutching for their wallet.

What surprised us was who made that admission: Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski.

It was just last year, after all, when the governor approved 33-percent pay raises for about 60 state agency directors over the 2007-09 biennium.

Last week Kulongoski decided to trim those raises, but only slightly.

Agency directors will not get the 3.2-percent cost-of-living raise scheduled for Nov. 1.

“The governor recognizes families are tightening their belts, and state government needs to as well,” said Anna Richter Taylor, the governor’s spokeswoman.

A nice sentiment.

But we doubt many Oregonians would describe nibbling a bit off a 33-percent raise as “tightening their belts.”

Skipping a second helping of apple pie, maybe.

Modest though it is, we hope Kulongoski’s gesture carries some clout.

Oregon’s 11-member Public Officials Compensation Commission, which suggests salaries for the governor and other elected officials, proposed last month to increase legislators’ pay by 22 percent and Kulongoski’s yearly salary by almost 40 percent, from $93,600 to $130,000.

The commission is supposed to finish its final recommendation in November. The Legislature has the authority to actually approve pay raises for itself and for other elected officials.

It’s quite unlikely that Oregon’s economy will recover by November, or by January when the Legislature convenes.

Until conditions improve substantially, state government cannot in good conscience enact pay raises even close to the levels that Kulongoski approved last year and that the public officials commission proposed last month.

Sure the commission might be able to make a compelling case with the numbers available.

After all, dozens of city, county and school district officials whose constituencies are far smaller than the governor’s draw higher salaries than Kulongoski’s annual pay of $93,600.

But now is not the time to make up for what didn’t happen in the past.

Not when many Oregonians worry more about keeping their paycheck than fattening it.