City of Miami Is Golden Goose for Some Employees

In a city where the median annual salary is just over $26,000, almost half of its government employees are raking in more than $100,000 per year.

In fact, City of Miami employees are some of the highest paid municipal workers in the country, even though they work for one of the poorest cities. They also work in a county that has a higher unemployment rate than the national average.

The numbers shatter the myth of the government worker accepting lower wages than the private sector in exchange for security and benefits.

No wonder the Magic City is going broke.

The figures were posted this week on the watchdog blog Eye on Miami, which obtained public records confirming that 1,751 (47.4%) of the city’s 3,694 full-time employees are making six-figure salaries.

One of those employees is Shirley Richardson, who lost her executive job with the City of Miami Civilian Investigative Panel after it was determined she was making too much for doing practically nothing. Now she is an assistant to an assistant and still makes $168,00 per year plus car and cell phone allowances with duties that are unspecified.

Furthermore, almost 100 City of Miami employees are making more than $200,000 a year, an astronomical number compared to cities of comparable size and cost-of-living, according to an article by the Biscayne Times newspaper.

For example, the City of Atlanta, which has a slightly higher population than Miami, employs only six people that make at least $200,000 per year.

The City of Miami employee who made the most last year is a fire-rescue captain named Jon Hart, who raked in a whopping $308,318.

And second on the list was a Miami police officer named Fernando Acosta who made $295,075 – just slightly more than Chief John Timoney’s salary of $290.533, who is fourth on the list.

Hart, a supervisor, is said to work as many as 100 hours a week to compensate for vacancies that have not been filled.

Meanwhile, more than 1,000 people lined up in early February to apply for one of 35 positions within the fire department. The city only accepted the first 750 applicants.

Back then, it was reported that the average salary for a Miami firefighter is $46,000 per year, meaning six firefighters can be hired full-time and still not make as much as Hart did last year.

Those six firefighters would put in at least 240 hours per week as opposed to Hart’s nearly 100 hours.

However, the union contract requires a supervisor to be on shift at all times, leaving one to wonder how hard can it be to hire new supervisors in order to not dish out so much in overtime.

In fact, the majority of the 97 city employees who make more than $200,000 per year are fire rescue employees, mostly supervisors. It is no wonder more than 1,500 people braved February’s chilly temperatures to apply for this lucrative job.

Fire-rescue employees also make up the bulk of those who make more than $100,00 per year with a total of 656 employees making that much.

And while the starting salary for a Miami police officer is $46,000, identical to the starting salary of a firefighter, there are only a handful of officers who make more than $200,000 a year.

However, 591 police officers make more than $100,000 per year. And, of course, many more make extra working off-duty but that is money that comes from the private sector.

And it’s no secret that Miami has one of the highest crime rates in the country, which could justify paying officers a decent salary.

But how does one justify paying an officer almost $300,000 per year to chauffeur around city commissioners?

That is how much Miami police officer Fernando Acosta made last year as “sergeant-of-arms”, which is described by the city as an executive-level position “responsible for maintaining order and providing security during any official assembly of the city commission” as well as “protective coverage” to commissioners.

He is also responsible for “coordinating necessary transportation for city commissioners to meetings and special events,” according to the Biscayne Times.

And when he's not doing that, we're sure he is laughing all the way to the bank.