Placer County supervisors make much less than their peers
By Ed Fletcher, Sacramento Bee
The five Placer County supervisors agree on this: At $30,000 annually, they’re underpaid. They also agree that nobody is going to do anything about it anytime soon.
The board earlier this month heard a staff report comparing an array of county salaries to those of similar-sized counties, other local entities and private-sector equivalents.
The report revealed that the county has a smaller per capita workforce than most of its peers, that Placer County employees earn about what their public-sector counterparts do and that comparing private- and public-sector jobs is easier said than done.
The numbers also showed there is a clear disparity between Placer County supervisors’ compensation and that of county supervisors from similar-sized counties.
Set at $30,000 in 1992 by voters, Placer supervisors’ pay is $69,821 less than the $99,821 average paid to supervisors in El Dorado, San Luis Obispo, Santa Cruz, Solano, Sonoma, Contra Costa and Sacramento counties.
Including benefits, the average annual supervisors’ salary of the seven “matching” counties (as selected by county staff) comes to $121,683 – almost four times the Placer supervisors’ total take of $31,154.