Raise for Dietrick, bonuses for Lichtig on tap at SLO Council

May 27, 2015
City Manager Katie Lichtig

City Manager Katie Lichtig

City Attorney Christine Dietrick may receive her fourth raise in four years, and City Manager Katie Lichtig may walk away with a cash bonus and car allowance at the upcoming San Luis Obispo council meeting.

On June 2, the council will consider giving Dietrick a 7 percent raise that would bump her base salary from $175,006 to $187,252. Lichtig ought to receive a one-time payment of $7,600, as well as a car allowance of $450 a month, or $5,400 annually, according to a staff report prepared by Human Resources Director Monica Irons.

The council gave preliminary approval to the compensation increases during an April 22 closed session hearing in which it met with a consultant. Final approval must occur in open session.

In 2011, Lichtig agreed to waive her car allowance. She has not received a raise since her hiring in 2010.

Christine Dietrick

Christine Dietrick

Dietrick, who was also hired in 2010, received a 3.5 percent raise in 2012, followed by a 4.5 percent bumpy in pay in 2013 and a 4.2 percent salary increase last year.

Irons’s report states that Dietrick’s salary has been well below the median of the comparison market in recent years. Irons describes the proposed 7 percent raise as a “market equity adjustment” that the council deemed appropriate.

Dietrick currently receives $256,759 in total compensation.

Lichtig’s base salary is $221,500. She currently makes $313,031 in total compensation.


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If Dietrick is paid under-market and she doesn’t like it, she should get another job. That would test the truth of whether the city should be paying her so much. She’s totally useless to the residents of this city — every time there’s any actual legal work to do she hires somebody else to do it. Go away Christine, and don’t bother us anymore.


By the way, when Lichtig gave up her car allowance several years back, Dietrick did not. That little nasty detail got unreported by the press. One always marvels that people who are paid so much think they need us to pay them for driving their cars on top of that. What’s wrong with this whole picture?