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Columbia City Council votes to increase their own salaries

For the first time in 17 years, the Columbia City Council is getting a raise.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — In a 4-2 vote, Columbia City Council voted to pass raises for themselves in a Tuesday meeting.

For the last 17 years, Columbia's elected council members have been making $13,350 per year. 

The new salary will be a $7000 raise, so now council members will make $20,350 per year. 

Council members, Dr. Aditi Bussells and Tina Herbert shared their thoughts on how this increase will help with recruiting young people and retaining people of various backgrounds.

"A Harvard Institute of Politics poll suggests that the millennial generation has become greatly disillusioned with the current political system and they find several barriers to running for office, especially millennial women. ..The same study shows that less than half of young people feel financially comfortable about running for office and are often deterred by the stress of fundraising, managing a home and public life, and of course a lack of privacy...We are leveling the playing field, we are allowing us the opportunity to diversify the class of people that actually run for office, and not just those who are stereotypically seen as politicians, white males from well-off backgrounds... I hope this change encourages the next generation of leadership to step up and run to help continue to increase representation in politics," Dr. Aditi Bussells said.

"Just to pick up on what Aditi said, I am a lawyer. I went through the list of all of the black council members I can remember... I have Luther Bastiste, lawyer, and E.W. Cromartie, Lawyer... even as a black, female attorney, I don't think that just black, female, attorneys should be on the city council. You have mothers, and folks who work in different stages of life, and with $20,000 there are so many financial barriers. It costs a lot financially to get into this, and you do that to just sometimes take a hit in your finances... This is not about my pockets, this is just to give more people the opportunity to even consider running," added Councilwoman Tina Herbert.

Councilman Howard Duvall says he created a study two years ago of salaries in comparable municipalities in the state. This time around, the city looked at the Municipal Association of South Carolina's numbers published for this year.

"The last time this council had a raise was 2006, 17 years ago. This particular ordinance raises the salary from $13,350 to $20,350 and I think it's well merited by the service that these council members serve," Duvall said.

Columbia currently has a population of about 130,000 people, similar in size would be Charleston which recently approved a raise to give their council members $20k, and Mount Pleasant at $15k per year.

This was only the first reading for the salary increase. It will go back before the council again on October 3.

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