City Councillors Increase Pay of Firemen, Police

The Cambridge City Council voted Monday night to grant a 23 per cent pay raise to City firemen and police over the next two years, making them the highest paid in the Commonwealth. The raises will cost Cambridge about $1,500,000 and will add five dollars to the tax rate.

The formal ordinances legalizing the raises have not yet passed, but after the Council voted them past a second reading Monday they were virtually assured of final approval at the next Council meeting on December 16.

Objections to the ordinances came from City Councillor Thomas D. Mahoney, who offered alternative plans calling for 18 per cent increases over two years. Mahoney's motions drew support only from Councillor Cornelia B. Wheeler and were defeated by a 7-2 vote.

The Council ironed out its differences with the police and firemen in a two-hour executive session before its regular meeting. The two departments had originally presented proposals calling for as much as a 43 per cent increase in wages.

Councillor Daniel J. Hayes Jr., speaking in favor of the ordinances which finally passed, called them "a fair compromise in view of the fact that Cambridge's police and firemen are the finest in the state."

Mahoney's chief objection to the ordinance centered around the tax--currently $82 per $1000 of property--which could rise as much as $20 next year. Mahoney said that the pay raises would affect rent payers as well as property owners and cited the increased school construction problem, the MBTA deficit, and the MDC charges as problems which the City must still face in its budget considerations.