During the course of the campaign, I found out that Bellingham city employees enjoy free health insurance premiums for themselves and their families. How nice! And I understand the city insures itself so the coverage is GOLD PLATED! How nice!

Wouldn't it be nice if the rest of us could afford to live as well as our public "servants?"

-- (Samizdat1@home.com), November 23, 1999

Answers

As long as overall compensation is reasonable, how the city chooses to arrange that compensation really doesn't bother me. There are advantages and disadvantages to high benefit packages.

The real issue ought to be are the taxpayers getting good value for the money. If they aren't, even minimum wage and no bennies is excessive. If they are, then the mix of money paid out as salary versus money paid out as benifits is kind of only marginally relevant. If the total compensation package is reasonable overall, it's reasonable overall.

-- Craig Carson (craigcar@crosswinds.net), November 23, 1999.

Craig, we agree!

-- dbvz (dbvz@wa.freei.net), November 23, 1999.