POWELL RIVER, B.C – At the council meeting on Thursday May 2nd, Powell River council voted in favour of the remuneration and reimbursement bylaw.
Under the proposed bylaw, by 2023, the mayor’s salary will be $60,600, and councillors’ salaries would see an increase to $23,300 in 2019, and to $25,200 in 2020.
In five years time, each councillor’s salary would be $31,800, under the proposed bylaw.
All of council voted in favour of the bylaw, except for councillor Cindy Elliott, who was the sole opposed.
Chief Financial Officer Adam Langenmaier noted that “the bylaw has been changed and the reference to an average wage in Powell River has been removed as it was difficult for a member of the public to reasonably determine what the remuneration was for Mayor and Council in any given year.”
“To increase transparency a 5-year remuneration schedule is being included in the bylaw,” he added.
On January 31 st, Langenmaier told the MyPowellRiverNow.com newsroom that, prior to 2019, changes to the Canadian Income Tax Act pay received by elected officials was subject to a one-third non-taxable allowance.
In short, one-third of the mayor’s and councillors’ salaries was exempt from income tax.
However, in the 2017 federal budget, the Federal Income Tax was revised to eliminate this allowance, leaving council’s remuneration fully taxable.
