Thursday, June 06, 2013
Livingston, Owens get fat pay hikes far exceeding their employees
The Austin Statesman reported last evening that Brad Livingston, executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, received a whopping $73,000 raise in the most recently approved state budget - nearly a 40% increase. He will now make $260K. Also, "Board of Pardons and Paroles Chairwoman Rissie Owens’ salary will jump from $126,500 to $172,000," for a 36% increase. See the rest of the story for more examples of agency executives receiving fat pay hikes far beyond those received by their employees, but these two criminal-justice examples are among the most eye-popping. My question is "Why?" Brad and Rissie a) aren't likely to go anywhere and b) aren't irreplaceable if they do. Why increase their salaries by more than a third? Who gets those kind of raises in this economy? I hadn't tracked the budget process closely during session so Grits didn't realize this was happening. Indeed, I'm not sure very many people did in the entire state. Bad optics.
This is ridiculous!
ReplyDeleteAnd doesn't Rissie Owens' son work as an aide to Sen. Whitmire? Worse optics!
ReplyDeleteGFY Whitmire. What an embarrassment to the state.
ReplyDeleteSoooooo how much work does Rissie actually do?
ReplyDeleteThe only politician who supported a larger pay raise for correctional officers was Senator John Whitmire. Huntsville's own state representative failed to stand up for correctional employees, despite the fact this is Representative John Otto's largest constituency group.
ReplyDeleteThe Texas Republican Party is screwing themselves in the future. Rural Texans tend to lead the changes in the Texas political environment. Blue dogs may return to rural Texas in the next four years due to the largest constituency being made up of rural governmental employees. The Republican Party's attack on Governmental employees will backfire in rural Texas with School Districts, Counties, and prisons being their largest employers.
The Texas Democratic Party and groups like Battleground Texas need to focus more resources on some targeted rural counties were blue dogs can make there way back. Voter education and registration can easily flip these counties that heavily rely on state governmental resources.
Great post
ReplyDeleteGET REAL! OMG, what were they thinking? Oh, they were not thinking!!! this really hits the hard working tax-payers in the face who are the providers of these funds...it is always easy to spend other peoples' monies isn't it!This is unacceptable,guess their employers (TAXPAYERS) are going to have to give them a "PINK" slip at the polls
ReplyDeleteThe two most corrupted agencies in this state. I guess being the leader of corrupted agencies does pay off.
ReplyDeleteDoes TDCJ have the same type of good-ole-boy system of rewarding the corrupt faithful that TYC had?
ReplyDelete40% & 36% pay increases are unheard of. TJJD employees are only getting 1% pay raise, except for the correctional officers of course, who get 5%.
ReplyDeleteTHANK GOD! Texas Legislators should be patted on their backs with a huge THANK YOU for not giving those sorry worthless Correctional Officers a larger pay raise. They are all dirty, rotten, crooks and should not have been given anything-NO PAY RAISE AT ALL! Ain't nothing but GLORIFIED BABY SITTERS like the Texas Legislators said they was.
ReplyDeleteTHANK GOD the TDCJ Executive Director got a nice raise, he should have gotten a 200% raise for having to put up with trash for staff. He deserved it!!! WAY TO GO TEXAS!!!! You milked the bull on this one...LOL!
Undortunately they wont be happy until they have a no gray day, and then what buddy, then what?
ReplyDelete