The West Windsor Township Council members who voted themselves a 50 percent pay raise last month are expected Monday night to take up Mayor Shing-Fu Hsueh’s veto of the measure.
One of the four, council President Will Anklowitz, has posed an alternative, a $3,000 annual “flat-rate reiumbursement” stipend, which would effectively raise council compensation by 60 percent. Linda Geevers, the only council member to oppose the raises, correctly identified this plan as “a new twist to get the council members more money.”
Mr. Anklowitz noted that the pay raise measure vetoed by the mayor included a provision that would enable voters to overturn it by forcing a referendum. The stipend resolution includes no such language and would thus elude the efforts of some local taxpayers who have already begun gathering petitions for a November ballot question.
”I am very disappointed that with the mayor’s veto that the public won’t have a chance to do a referendum like they were working on,” Mr. Anklowitz said.
Normally, we would be pleased to see a public official extend a hand in sympathy to beleaguered taxpayers. But in this case, only one of five fingers appears to have been employed in the gesture.
