Council that will set state lawmakers' pay is a big draw

Minnesotans, it seems, really want to decide how much their state lawmakers are paid.

Despite the lack of organized campaigns for or against a proposal for a citizen panel to set legislative salaries, voters supported the idea overwhelmingly on Election Day. More than 76 percent of voters opted to strip legislators of the power to set their pay and turn it over to the new group.

By about a month later, 250 people had turned in their résumés and applications, hoping to be one of the first to serve on the new Legislative Salary Council. That's far more interest than usual for participating in one of the state's many citizen advisory panels and commissions. Most come with little recognition, long meetings and only a small stipend for the days on which the group meets. But the chance to set legislators' pay has prompted one of the largest numbers of applicants for such a group in recent history, nearing the mark set when 266 people applied for Metropolitan Council seats in 2011.

Gov. Mark Dayton is responsible for appointing half of the Legislative Salary Council's 16 members. The deadline to apply for those eight seats has passed, and the governor's office is sorting through the 238 applications for the eight seats. Meanwhile, the competition for the eight seats to be appointed by Chief Justice Lorie Skjerven Gildea is much less fierce, likely because her appointments have received less attention. As of Friday, just 12 people had applied for the slots, but there's still time for more. The deadline for those seats is 4:30 p.m. Dec. 12.

Both the governor and the chief justice will have to pick one applicant from each of the state's eight congressional districts, and each will need to select four Democrats and four Republicans. None of their picks can be current or former legislators or their spouses, current employees of the Legislature, current or former lobbyists, judges, governors or other state officials. They'll have to work quickly, as state statute dictates that the appointments must be made by Jan. 2. The group is expected to meet for the first time by Jan. 15, and decide on legislators' pay by March 31.

The panel will make decisions on lawmakers' salaries in each odd-numbered year, and changes will take effect on July 1 of the same year.

The dash by so many Minnesotans to serve on the council is notable, considering the group will make decisions on a topic on which many lawmakers have purposely kept a low profile. Legislators make $31,140 per year and haven't received a raise since 1999. Many lawmakers have worried that voting for more pay wouldn't play well with voters.

"I think our legislators are terribly underpaid," he said. "It's a huge responsibility and I think that anybody who thinks it's a part-time job doesn't follow the schedule of an average legislator."