Mayor Parker’s top deputies are earning big salaries compared with their predecessors

Close advisers to new Philadelphia Mayor Cherelle L. Parker are among the city’s most highly paid public employees, with their salaries topping $200,000 a year, and in some cases exceeding the mayor’s own pay.

That’s according to city payroll data that show some of Parker’s top aides earning significantly more than their predecessors in the same or similar roles. The salary increases come as the mayor has expanded the number of people in her office and proposed increasing its budget by 150%.

An Inquirer analysis found that 16 of Parker’s closest cabinet members collectively earn $3.5 million, or about one million dollars more than their peers did under former Mayor Jim Kenney last year.

That jump is due to year-over-year salary increases averaging about 16% — and in certain cases as high as 32%.

The highest-paid person on the organizational chart is new Police Commissioner Kevin J. Bethel, who earns $340,000 a year, a raise of 2.7% over former Commissioner Danielle Outlaw. His salary is the second highest among police chiefs in the 10 largest U.S. cities, and nearly $100,000 more a year than the head of the New York Police Department, which has six times the number of officers as Philly.

One of the most significant pay increases among Parker’s top staff was for Managing Director Adam K. Thiel. The former fire commissioner who now oversees city operations earns $310,000 — a 32% increase over his Kenney administration predecessor.

Two other top officials earn more than Parker herself, whose salary is $261,500. Atif Saeed, CEO of the Philadelphia International Airport, makes $335,000 a year, which represents a standard 3% increase over his pay last year. And Chief Public Safety Director Adam Geer — who coordinates the city’s anticrime efforts outside of the Police Department — earns $265,000, a salary mandated under legislation that created the position last year.

Parker’s closest aides, whom she refers to as the “big three” — Chief of Staff Tiffany W. Thurman and Chief Deputy Mayors Aren Platt and Sinceré Harris — each make $245,000 a year. That’s almost 16% more than Kenney’s chief of staff made last year. Communications Director Joe Grace makes $180,000, about 31% more than his predecessor.

All of those top advisers — and about two dozen mayor’s office staffers in all — earn more than elected City Council members, whose salaries are currently set at $155,300.

» READ MORE: Philly Council members get paid more than New York City legislators

Pay increases for top staffers hired by Parker were also notably higher than salaries for city officials who were retained from the Kenney administration. In most cases, people kept on from the previous administration saw raises between 3% and 7%.

Camille A. Duchaussée, the chief administrative officer who oversees human resources, said in a statement that pay ranges for top officers were set based on comparable salaries in other jurisdictions, cost of living, and a review of current salaries in relation to the size and scope of departments. All the salaries fall within those ranges set by the Office of Human Resources.

The administration wanted to ensure that employees were compensated in line with their “experience and professional credentials,” Duchaussée said, adding that the city is committed “to fair and competitive compensation across all job specifications.”

Parker administration officials have previously said salaries in the mayor’s office were likely to rise in order to attract or retain top executive talent.

The mayor in March proposed a $15.2 million budget for the mayor’s office — the largest year-over-year budget increase of any department. Most other city agencies would see little to no increase in funding under Parker’s plan, which still faces Council’s approval.

The jump in mayor’s office spending is largely due to higher salaries — average pay jumped from $98,000 to $118,500, a 21% increase — and the addition of 74 new jobs.

“We’re … ensuring that salaries are competitive,” Thurman said at the time. “It’s important for municipal leaders and those in the mayor’s office to represent what we’re seeking here, which is the best and brightest in leadership.”

» READ MORE: Mayor Parker’s own office got the biggest funding boost in her budget proposal

Yet nearly all of Parker’s top officials already lived in Philadelphia when they were hired, many were current or former city employees, and some had worked directly for her in the past. Some of these picks drew scrutiny, including appointments of spouses of three Council members to a string of roles.

Parker’s administration has defended hiring the members’ spouses. And the mayor said she was “pleasantly surprised” that so many of her hires ended up being from Philadelphia.

“These people just had a Philly grit, determination, a resilience. They just had it,” she said in December.

Of more than 70 appointments Parker has made, over a dozen were already in her political orbit.

At least seven people now earning a city salary worked for Parker’s historic mayoral campaign, including Harris and Platt, who were her campaign manager and political consultant, respectively. Five other campaign advisers are also now aides in City Hall.

Hiring campaign staffers to administration posts is a time-honored practice. Most past mayors have similarly filled out their offices with people they are familiar with and who are loyal to them, as have executives at the state and federal level.

And eight more people Parker hired to work in her administration had previously been employed by former Council President Darrell L. Clarke, who did not seek reelection last year. Four of the former Clarke staffers are among 11 special aides assigned to Parker’s chief of staff.

New Chief Information Officer Melissa Scott has ties to Parker’s political coalition. In 2018, she ran unsuccessfully against progressive state Rep. Chris Rabb, who has been an antagonist of the Northwest Coalition. Scott’s appointment coincided with a shake-up of the department that led former staff to publicly raise concerns.

Parker’s administration also includes new community engagement and outreach teams, three of which are led by people who unsuccessfully sought seats on City Council last year. Donavan West, Parker’s director of business roundtables, will lead outreach to major employers. Will Mega is the deputy director of neighborhood and community engagement, and Abu Edwards is the director of Black male engagement.

The mayor also hired a fourth former Council candidate, Luz Colón, to be one of six special assistants.

Duchaussée, the chief administrative officer, said in a statement that the decision to appoint former campaign and Council staffers “was based on related experience and continuity of operational knowledge and strategy.”

“Preferences were neither applicable nor afforded,” she said.

The city has meanwhile struggled to hire for thousands of rank-and-file positions, from librarians to 911 dispatchers, and labor leaders have said pay could be a key factor. Average pay for civil service employees who make up the majority of the 26,000-member workforce was about $69,000 last year, according to the city’s payroll data.

The administration’s spending projections assume wages among civilian employees who aren’t represented by a union — meaning those who aren’t uniformed such as police and firefighters — will grow 4.5% this year. The city is in the process of negotiating with two of the city’s largest municipal unions that represent other civilian workers, and a citywide pay study is underway.

During a March budget hearing, City Councilmember Nicolas O’Rourke asked Parker administration officials about the mayor’s office salaries and whether commensurate raises would be offered to “frontline” city workers.

Duchaussée said the city will continuously review salaries and has contracted with a third-party firm to conduct a pay assessment across “several departments” to ensure that pay is competitive with peer cities.

“We’re absolutely committed to making sure that there is continuous assessment of our salaries,” she said, “that we are paying a wage that is livable, that contributes to our ability to recruit and retain talent.”

Inquirer staff writer Sean Collins Walsh contributed to this article.

An earlier online version of this article included a salary for Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw that did not account for a final pay raise she received about six months before her resignation. Two other salary increase percentages were revised to account for new payroll data.