Mandeville council splits difference on mayoral pay raise

The Mandeville City Council has approved a spending plan for the 2024-2025 fiscal year after an exhausting discussion highlighted by a debate over a proposal to give Mayor Clay Madden an almost 30% pay raise. At the Aug. 22 council meeting, the circuitous debate over Madden’s compensation resulted in a decision to give the mayor a smaller pay hike of about 11%, from $105,880 to $118,000 a year. The budget, which takes effect Sept. 1, features roughly $21.8 million in operational expenses, which is about $900,000 more than what was approved for the current fiscal year, officials said. The council also approved $14.9 million in spending on capital projects, some of which could be carried over into future budgets.

The hourslong discussion on the budget got off to a contentious start when Councilman Kevin Vogeltanz offered to amend the spending plan to raise the mayor’s salary to $140,000 a year. As originally drafted, the budget included a pay raise of 2.46% for the mayor. During a budget hearing on Aug. 21, Vogeltanz suggested the larger mayoral pay raise. (The council held a series of hearings in July and August to discuss the budget for the coming fiscal year.) Vogeltnz said currently there are 10 people in the city administration who make more than Madden. “If you believe in the exceptionalism of the city of Mandeville, and I do, and if you believe Mandeville is the best lakefront city in the state of Louisiana … I think you have to pay the CEO a salary commensurate with the work we expect a CEO to do,” he said. “If we want to continue to recruit the best people, we have to pay the market rate.” Council member Jason Zuckerman sided with Vogeltanz, saying he didn’t agree with a council decision in 2019 that cut former Mayor Donald Villere’s annual salary from about $115,000 to $96,000.

If the council had not made that decision, the mayor’s salary would have grown to $130,000 with the typical cost of living increases. Council member Cynthia Strong-Thompson acknowledged that some sort of a raise may be warranted for the mayor. However, she urged her colleagues to pump the brakes on the hefty pay raise, saying the public was “blindsided” by the last minute move. “I don’t like the way it was done last night,” she said, referring to the pay raise proposal Vogeltanz unveiled at the Wednesday budget hearing. “We need to be good stewards of the public’s money and this should be an item that we call a different meeting for to make this decision.”

She also pointed out that at $140,000 the Mandeville mayor would be making more than other mayors in the region, including those who govern cities with much large populations. Council chairman Scott Discon said he was uncomfortable with such a “huge jump” in the mayor’s pay. “It doesn’t look right. It doesn’t feel good,” he said. A vote on Vogeltanz’s motion to set the salary at $140,000 failed 3-2, with Strong-Thompson, Discon and Jill McGuire in opposition. McGuire then offered a compromise proposal to increase the mayor’s pay to $118,000. That take-it-or-leave-it proposal gave the council an option of either setting the pay at that rate or leaving it at the 2.46% increase that was originally budgeted. The council voted unanimously in favor of the compromise.

The budget for the coming fiscal year includes money for drainage projects in several neighborhoods, including Old Golden Shores, Beau Rivage, Fontainebleau and Woodstone.It also contains funding for about 70% of the cost of a new police station headquarters, the development of one or more new parks and money to complete a beautification project at the heavily-traveled “four corners” intersection of La. 22 and North Causeway Boulevard.