Conflict Continues over Ted Wheeler Staff Salaries (Updated with Lunch Date)

The controversy continues over recent raises for two top staffers to Multnomah County Chair Ted Wheeler while other county employees agreed to a pay freeze.

First, from Wheeler's Twitter feed:



That tweet follows an email last week where Wheeler asked Becky Steward and Michael Hanna out to lunch to discuss the controversy. Steward is president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 88, the county's largest employee union. Hanna is the union's vice president.

Given Wheeler's tweet, that invitation apparently hasn't received a response.

Wheeler is scheduled to have lunch with the union's leadership Tuesday at Madison's. (Might we recommend the kids' menu?)

Steward and Hanna posted a letter (PDF) on Local 88's website demanding that Wheeler rescind the raises for his chief of staff and chief operating officer and apologize to union members.

Wheeler's in turn posted this explanation on his own website.

In another development, Wheeler's chief operating officer, Jana McLellan, responded this morning to WW's query about the amount of her raise — a piece of information missing from our original post.

McLellan says her salary was bumped up from $110,000 to $120,000 on July 1 — as negotiated with Wheeler last year before the salary freezes went into place.