There are many reasons people are drawn to serve on the borough assembly, but the pay is not one of them. With just a small stipend, it’s generally understood the position is public service, and not a job with a living wage.
However, it’s possible assembly members are entitled to more than they are currently receiving. Lesser-known sections of borough code give assembly members the option of receiving borough health insurance, which some current and former assembly members said they did not know.
The option for assembly health insurance appears twice in borough code, mostly clearly in a subsection titled “health insurance,” which states that “the mayor and members of the assembly may enroll in the borough’s health insurance plan with the borough paying the same monthly co-pay amount as set forth in the collective bargaining agreement with borough employees.”
According to a different subsection on assembly member compensation, “assembly members shall also receive the life insurance, major medical, dental, and optical, workers compensation and PERS benefits available under the current plans adopted by the borough for themselves only and if they have elected to do so.”
Current assembly members Craig Loomis, Kevin Forster, and Gabe Thomas said they were not aware that they were entitled to these benefits, and it had not been discussed during their time serving on the assembly. Thomas is the longest serving of these three, first elected in 2019.
The actual process, were assembly members to decide they wanted borough health insurance, is somewhat unclear. Borough finance director Jila Stuart said she “[had] always understood [the language in code] to mean the assembly as a body would have to decide to opt in.”
Interim borough manager Alekka Fullerton said that in the past, union officials had stated that every assembly member would have to opt in.
If still the case, this all-or-none requirement would make returning health insurance to the assembly more complicated. Some assembly members would likely want to maintain their own healthcare plans, which, Fullerton said, was what happened the last time the option was brought up.
Reintroducing assembly member health care would also be a significant change to borough finances. The $175 per meeting rate that assembly members currently make comes out to roughly $5,000 per year. According to the interim manager’s proposed budget for the upcoming year, the borough’s health insurance plan costs $20,184 per person, per year. That means for assembly members, adding borough health insurance could be up to a five-fold raise in total compensation.
Some say that could be a good thing. Forster, currently the youngest member of the assembly, said he did not have an official opinion on what the assembly should do. But he did say that the benefit could incentivize underrepresented groups to run for assembly.
“People want more representation for younger, working class people,” Forster said. “[Health insurance] is a really enticing idea, because it would benefit younger people.”
Former assembly members Ben Aultman-Moore and Tyler Huling independently echoed this sentiment. Huling said additional compensation “would be helpful in reducing the personal cost of local leadership.”
Aultman-Moore said he had drafted a petition to give assembly members health insurance, and during that process learned it was already, at least partly, in code.
“I think younger working people would be more willing to volunteer for the job and have more time to do it effectively [if given health insurance],” he said.
But Thomas, the second youngest on the current assembly, said that given the choice, he wouldn’t be opting in.
“I don’t think we deserve that, and I personally don’t think we should even be getting paid,” Thomas said. “We’re not state legislators, and this isn’t a career position. Leave the big politics to the big politicians. We’re supposed to take care of our community.”