35% pay raises for Oklahoma legislators take effect Wednesday

For the first time in more than two decades, Oklahoma legislators will see an increase in their pay.

Effective Wednesday, legislators will see their annual salaries jump from $35,021 to $47,500, a 35% pay increase.

The pay raises, approved last year by the Legislative Compensation Board, take effect at a time when the state’s finances look dramatically different than they did prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The pay raises are funded through the state budget that took effect July 1 and included 4% cuts for most state agencies and the House and Senate.

The roughly $1.4 million to fund the legislative pay raises this year is a drop in the bucket compared to the state’s overall $7.7 billion budget, but legislative leaders from both parties agreed the timing doesn’t look good.

“The politics of it are awful,” said House Majority Floor Leader Jon Echols. “The optics of it are bad, so the question becomes why did the legislative compensation committee do it? Well, they met pre-COVID.

“I will be just as supportive if they come in and lower legislative pay the next time if that’s what they believe is the right call. If they keep it the same, I’m OK with that, too.”

Echols, R-Oklahoma City, was adamant that the board, which meets in odd-numbered years and comprises non-elected officials appointed by the governor, House speaker and Senate pro tempore, should not boost legislative pay again in 2021.

The board that met in 2019 consisted of all new members and sought to reverse a previous legislative pay cut that they saw as punitive. In 2017, the board met and cut legislators’ pay by about $3,400 — likely a result of the political gridlock at the Capitol.

Echols said he wants legislators who aren’t driven by the salary, but who are called to serve. He said he’s not aware of any legislators who opted not to seek re-election because of the pay cut nor is he aware of any legislators who decided to run this year because of the pay bump.

The National Conference of State Legislatures considers the Oklahoma Legislature to be a hybrid, somewhere between part-time and full-time. Legislators working at “hybrid” legislatures earn an average of $30,485 per year.

Average legislator pay is $38,370 across the 41 states that pay legislators per year, according to NCSL.

Because the Oklahoma Legislature meets from February through May and often requires additional work and involvement outside of the traditional session, some legislators struggle to find other work, Echols said.

“There’s a lot of us in office that, frankly, lose money being in the legislature because it is very difficult to find another job that will only let you work for six months a year,” he said. "I also don’t cry for those individuals because nobody made us do this work. I want legislators doing this job out of a sense of selflessness, a sense that their overall desire is to make this state better.”

The politics of pay raises

Legislators don’t set their own salaries, but that didn’t stop the pay raises from coming up time and again on the campaign trail this year.

The issue came up in several legislative races where incumbents faced primary challengers.

In Oklahoma’s hotly contested Congressional District 5 race, outside groups accused state Sen. Stephanie Bice of signing off on her own pay raise because she voted on the state budget that included the pay raises.

But the pay raises are not optional. Lawmakers are constitutionally required to fund their salaries at the level set by the compensation board, Echols said.

“If we only give $2 to the state Legislature, it has to go to legislative pay, and no matter what we do, we have to fund pay first,” he said.

Oklahomans have the right to be skeptical of the raises, but legislators don’t set their own pay, said House Minority Leader Emily Virgin, D-Norman.

It’s not talked about often, but paying legislators a living wage broadens the pool of who can run for office, she said. Several members of the Compensation Board echoed similar sentiments last year when debating the raises.

When legislative salaries are low, more candidates who are independently wealthy tend to run, Virgin said.

“When our pay was lower than teachers in Oklahoma and we were trying to get more educators involved in running for office, it was really hard to recruit good people to run because the pay had been cut,” she said.

House Democrats believe all Oklahomans deserve a living wage, and will continue fighting to raise Oklahoma’s minimum wage and implement more equitable tax policies for low-income residents and those in the middle class, Virgin said.

House Democrats lost five seats in the most recent election and the GOP majority in chamber has repeatedly shunned attempts to raise the state’s minimum wage.

“I can imagine that someone who’s making minimum wage, working two or three jobs and still struggling to get by would look at this pay raise and be outraged,” Virgin said. “I certainly understand that. That’s why we’ll be fighting for those folks just as hard as we always have.”

The compensation board also boosted stipend checks given to legislative leaders on top of their annual salaries.

Stipends for House Speaker Charles McCall and Senate Pro Tem Greg Treat increase from $16,354 to $17,932. For other legislative leaders, stipends will jump from $11,276 to $12,364.

When the pay raises are annualized, the total cost will be about $2.4 million. The cost is lower this year because the raises are not in effect for the full fiscal year.