{"id":407635,"date":"2026-07-22T06:30:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T06:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/407635\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T06:30:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T06:30:10","slug":"chula-vista-city-council-votes-down-45k-proposed-pay-raise-after-residents-voiced-grievances-nbc-7-san-diego","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/407635\/","title":{"rendered":"Chula Vista City Council votes down $45K proposed pay raise after residents voiced grievances \u2013 NBC 7 San Diego"},"content":{"rendered":"

A ballot measure that would revamp how the city of Chula Vista is managed and give councilmembers a massive pay raise won\u2019t be moving forward as proposed.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday night councilmembers voted down the pay raise after two hours of residents giving them a mouthful about the increase.<\/p>\n

The 4-to-1 vote, with Councilmember Michael Inzuna being the lone no vote, was met with applause.<\/p>\n

The proposal would have given them a near 70% raise from $65,000 per year to $110,000 for a part time job.<\/p>\n

“I think it’s kind of a disgrace,\u201d says Sandra Chavez who used to work for the city. “They campaigned on serving the community, but now I feel like they’re just serving their pockets.”<\/p>\n

\u201cThey’re trying to get themselves a huge pay raise that some people in their whole lifetime will never achieve,” said Chula Vista resident Anna Renwick.<\/p>\n

\"<\/p>\n

Chula Vista residents created colorful posters emblazoned with the images of councilmembers for the city council meeting on July 21, 2026. (NBC 7 San Diego)<\/p>\n

The last minute motion to remove pay increases was proposed by Mayor John McCann, who\u2019s been a staunch opponent of the salary bump.<\/p>\n

\u201cLeadership is not measured by salary, it’s measured by integrity, vision, accessibility,\u201d said Mayor McCann. \u201cIt\u2019s a willingness to put constituents first.\u201d<\/p>\n

The original initiative was proposed by the Laborer’s International Union of North America.<\/p>\n

Now that the pay raise has been voted down and creating a commission for future pay raises has been taken off the table, the measure could make at least 10 changes to the charter. They included councilmembers getting a third term in office, increasing their time to 16 years.<\/p>\n

\"<\/p>\n

Chula Vista residents arrive at a city council meeting where the council is expected to vote on proposed pay raises for themselves on July 21, 2026. (NBC 7 San Diego)<\/p>\n

It would also have created a lobbying ordinance, as well as new governance and ethics rules.<\/p>\n

“Chula Vista needs leaders who can stay long enough to finish hard projects,\u201d said Laborer\u2019s International Union member, Al Sanchez.<\/p>\n

“I support the new ethics commission. It has real power to investigate and order audits,” Sanchez said.<\/p>\n

The charter commission will now get a chance to look over the ballot measure, before its returned to council for a vote.<\/p>\n

Now word on how long it will take the commission to review it, but city leaders suspect the review won\u2019t be completed in time for the Aug. 7 deadline to make it on the November ballot.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A ballot measure that would revamp how the city of Chula Vista is managed and give councilmembers a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":407636,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[9974,74,76,75],"class_list":["post-407635","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-chula-vista","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=407635"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407635\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/407636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=407635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=407635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=407635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}