What a loss it was that Becka Thompson did not win in Ward 12 for city council. She is just that wonky mathy person you mentioned. During her campaign she showed analysis and solutions to the current predicament. And she is still writing about it on Substack. As she says, numbers don’t lie, and in Minneapolis the numbers aren’t adding up.
That's not a salary though, it's how much they were paid. It includes overtime but also if they had an unusual circumstance like a retroactive lump sum it would all land in one year. I'm not excusing it but it's an explanation other than "his salary is $500k and he's earning more this year."
You may be right, which is why I suggest the city should be reporting on salaries and pay increases in an very transparent way. Instead, they leave it up to people like us to search http://GovSalaries.com and make assumptions. City officials are leaving residents in the dark and expecting us to accept tax increases on faith.
I have to say, when I read Aisha Chugtai saying that "the MPD is defunding Minneapolis" or words to that effect I disregarded it on a account of the source--but man score one for the Progressives on this issue, she was right.
It’s been commonly known by people working in public service jobs in Minnesota that if you want a big payday, secure a gig in Minneapolis.
I haven’t looked up recently but back in the day Committee Legislative Administrations working for the chair of important committees were paid dramatically less than many much lower level staffers in Minneapolis.
I was first alerted to this pay discrepancy by those staff working at the capital who would say, “If I want to make the big money in public service I’m going to need to secure a position in Minneapolis.”
I'd say it's time for a Review and Reset on some of these salaries. That large of an increase had to have been signed off on by somebody. Let's connect the dots.
Terry no disrespect to your (and the reader you quoted) journalistic skills, but have you thought about contacting the Star Tribune? They've done some great articles with embedded charts, graphs, etc. I'd also be curious to hear more about these salary increases, and whether there's anything we're not seeing in the data that make it more defensible. This seems worth a deeper dive.
The outliers are pretty wild, but I do think it's important to emphasize the second half of this sentence:
"An Assistant City Coordinator for Convention Center operations earned $251,939, which the site put at 431 percent above the city’s average salary and 1,538 percent above the median."
Great article overall, but would be helpful to include those raw numbers for average and median salary along with the eye-popping one-off cases. My rough mental math puts the average salary just below $60k and the median much lower than that. Just want to call that out for folks who read this article and think all City employees are making six figures.
According to GovSalaries.com, the average employee for the City made $47k in 2024 and the median was $15k (part-time employees bring that down quite a bit). On the whole, employees at the City make 36% less than the Minnesota state average: https://govsalaries.com/salaries/MN/city-of-minneapolis
The data is really fascinating and well worth a few minutes of time. But I just want to note that both the median and average is dragged down a lot by large numbers of election workers at the low end who only work one day a year. It would be interesting to know how eliminating all these election workers from the calculations would affect the numbers.
Thank you for this context. It’s difficult as an outsider to know the specifics, it’s why I’d like to see more transparency before they pass a budget that raises property taxes another 11.3%
Speaking as one of them, they are not employees. I'd be surprised if poll workers are any factor other than the budget for EVS itself and the overall bottom line.
Another great piece Terry. I'm way out of my depth when it comes to tax and finance policy (as well as a few other things!) but are the huge police salaries the result of an understaffed force, thus huge sums paid for overtime? And wasn't there a lot more overtime when ICE was hyperactive in our city? Or is that just a fig leaf covering for salary increases? If we had more cops, thus less overtime, the salaries would go back down, right? More cops would still cost more money, but the salaries would not be so inflated. Isn't the overtime what is putting the MPD way over budget?
The number one issue on many people's minds is public safety, so is paying an exhausted cop to work extra hours justifiable?
I'm really curious now about other city and county employees who are not involved in public safety but have seen these huge raises.
Oh, right, on second read I caught that. So, it will be even worse next time the data is gathered, right? But, a few years ago I wrote something about the MPD and the need for them to get a raise because their salary was like 16th in the state, with cops in Maple Grove and other small municipalities making substantially more than Mpls cops. There must be something skewing that. Again, could it be overtime because the department is so understaffed?
Yes, it seems likely that overtime pay is inflating some of the salary numbers for police. I’d like to see the city create a report that explains why some of these are so high, both for the police and the other positions documented. If the city were more transparent we would need to hunt and peck through the website.
I hold Margaret Anderson Kelliher in high regard—she is exceptionally capable and a pleasure to work with. Her career trajectory, however, highlights the stark differences in public sector pay scales and the financial advantages of municipal executive roles in Minneapolis. During her time as Speaker of the House—a role tasked with helping manage the state's entire budget—her legislative salary was $31,140. Moving to state cabinet leadership as MnDOT Commissioner raised her pay by 388% to $152,024, and stepping into her executive position with the City of Minneapolis brought another 67% to 109% increase ($254,000–$318,000). That represents an overall compensation growth of 716% to 921% from her legislative days to her current municipal role.
A salary analysis is welcome, and an honest assessment of which newfangled departments of the last 10-20 years are essential. Five of the current CMs don't have even a fingernail on many of these upstarts. They've been saddled with them by past CMs on a thoughtless joyride, and they owe nothing but to the broad citizenry and the future viability of the city they supposedly manage.
An issue all over, and the money part of this is HUGE for our cities, but ALSO, should these folks in these critical positions be working THIS much, with so many very long days...AND so often?!
We would NOT allow this for truck drivers, pilots etc, due to SAFETY concerns for them and others, but for law enforcement employees, in this very demanding line of work, this can't be good.
S.F.’s top-paid employee made $900K. Here’s what every city worker gets paid
"SFPD has struggled with staffing levels in recent years, seeing the first year of staffing increase since the pandemic in 2025. A previous Chronicle analysis found officers working marathon shifts, including one sergeant who logged nearly 1,700 overtime hours in a single year.
City officials have proposed strategies to reduce overtime spending, such as staffing police units with retired officers, all while increasing funding for public safety agencies."
Minnesota is a state where government is one of the largest employers, and also the employer growing the most, with the biggest gains in net employees. This is a reflection of the amount of political will and dollars that flow into creating and protecting government jobs (especially around social safety net programs). Between union advocacy (and unions are strongest in government jobs, not the private sector), and DFL trifectas, and a general hostility to private businesses within the DFL, this is not a surprising result.
"The state government saw the biggest increase in employment on the list. The state added the most employees at 1,596 positions."
And that's just the state government. I've lost track of how many of my neighbors work for the City of Minneapolis or Hennepin County, or non-profits that provide services to those entities.
What a loss it was that Becka Thompson did not win in Ward 12 for city council. She is just that wonky mathy person you mentioned. During her campaign she showed analysis and solutions to the current predicament. And she is still writing about it on Substack. As she says, numbers don’t lie, and in Minneapolis the numbers aren’t adding up.
A police lieutenant salary approaching half a million dollars a year!!??? Something wrong there.
It’s interesting to poke around the data base. Keep in mind, the data is from 2024, so salaries will be even higher now.
That's not a salary though, it's how much they were paid. It includes overtime but also if they had an unusual circumstance like a retroactive lump sum it would all land in one year. I'm not excusing it but it's an explanation other than "his salary is $500k and he's earning more this year."
You may be right, which is why I suggest the city should be reporting on salaries and pay increases in an very transparent way. Instead, they leave it up to people like us to search http://GovSalaries.com and make assumptions. City officials are leaving residents in the dark and expecting us to accept tax increases on faith.
At least for state employees the hourly pay is reported separately from total compensation.
Yes
https://govsalaries.com/salaries/MN/city-of-minneapolis
specifically. These salaries are insane--and the top city salaries are *all* in the police department. What is going on?!?
I have to say, when I read Aisha Chugtai saying that "the MPD is defunding Minneapolis" or words to that effect I disregarded it on a account of the source--but man score one for the Progressives on this issue, she was right.
It’s been commonly known by people working in public service jobs in Minnesota that if you want a big payday, secure a gig in Minneapolis.
I haven’t looked up recently but back in the day Committee Legislative Administrations working for the chair of important committees were paid dramatically less than many much lower level staffers in Minneapolis.
I was first alerted to this pay discrepancy by those staff working at the capital who would say, “If I want to make the big money in public service I’m going to need to secure a position in Minneapolis.”
I'd say it's time for a Review and Reset on some of these salaries. That large of an increase had to have been signed off on by somebody. Let's connect the dots.
Terry no disrespect to your (and the reader you quoted) journalistic skills, but have you thought about contacting the Star Tribune? They've done some great articles with embedded charts, graphs, etc. I'd also be curious to hear more about these salary increases, and whether there's anything we're not seeing in the data that make it more defensible. This seems worth a deeper dive.
Ha, coincidentally they even have an article today breaking down pay gap ratios at major companies. Very much along the lines of this piece.
The outliers are pretty wild, but I do think it's important to emphasize the second half of this sentence:
"An Assistant City Coordinator for Convention Center operations earned $251,939, which the site put at 431 percent above the city’s average salary and 1,538 percent above the median."
Great article overall, but would be helpful to include those raw numbers for average and median salary along with the eye-popping one-off cases. My rough mental math puts the average salary just below $60k and the median much lower than that. Just want to call that out for folks who read this article and think all City employees are making six figures.
According to GovSalaries.com, the average employee for the City made $47k in 2024 and the median was $15k (part-time employees bring that down quite a bit). On the whole, employees at the City make 36% less than the Minnesota state average: https://govsalaries.com/salaries/MN/city-of-minneapolis
The data is really fascinating and well worth a few minutes of time. But I just want to note that both the median and average is dragged down a lot by large numbers of election workers at the low end who only work one day a year. It would be interesting to know how eliminating all these election workers from the calculations would affect the numbers.
Thank you for this context. It’s difficult as an outsider to know the specifics, it’s why I’d like to see more transparency before they pass a budget that raises property taxes another 11.3%
Speaking as one of them, they are not employees. I'd be surprised if poll workers are any factor other than the budget for EVS itself and the overall bottom line.
Another great piece Terry. I'm way out of my depth when it comes to tax and finance policy (as well as a few other things!) but are the huge police salaries the result of an understaffed force, thus huge sums paid for overtime? And wasn't there a lot more overtime when ICE was hyperactive in our city? Or is that just a fig leaf covering for salary increases? If we had more cops, thus less overtime, the salaries would go back down, right? More cops would still cost more money, but the salaries would not be so inflated. Isn't the overtime what is putting the MPD way over budget?
The number one issue on many people's minds is public safety, so is paying an exhausted cop to work extra hours justifiable?
I'm really curious now about other city and county employees who are not involved in public safety but have seen these huge raises.
Thanks, Susan. http://GovSalaries.com only has data from 2024, so before Operation Metro Surge.
Oh, right, on second read I caught that. So, it will be even worse next time the data is gathered, right? But, a few years ago I wrote something about the MPD and the need for them to get a raise because their salary was like 16th in the state, with cops in Maple Grove and other small municipalities making substantially more than Mpls cops. There must be something skewing that. Again, could it be overtime because the department is so understaffed?
Yes, it seems likely that overtime pay is inflating some of the salary numbers for police. I’d like to see the city create a report that explains why some of these are so high, both for the police and the other positions documented. If the city were more transparent we would need to hunt and peck through the website.
Tbf, Minneapolis has to pay exorbitant salaries. Otherwise, employees couldn't afford their property taxes.
I hold Margaret Anderson Kelliher in high regard—she is exceptionally capable and a pleasure to work with. Her career trajectory, however, highlights the stark differences in public sector pay scales and the financial advantages of municipal executive roles in Minneapolis. During her time as Speaker of the House—a role tasked with helping manage the state's entire budget—her legislative salary was $31,140. Moving to state cabinet leadership as MnDOT Commissioner raised her pay by 388% to $152,024, and stepping into her executive position with the City of Minneapolis brought another 67% to 109% increase ($254,000–$318,000). That represents an overall compensation growth of 716% to 921% from her legislative days to her current municipal role.
A salary analysis is welcome, and an honest assessment of which newfangled departments of the last 10-20 years are essential. Five of the current CMs don't have even a fingernail on many of these upstarts. They've been saddled with them by past CMs on a thoughtless joyride, and they owe nothing but to the broad citizenry and the future viability of the city they supposedly manage.
An issue all over, and the money part of this is HUGE for our cities, but ALSO, should these folks in these critical positions be working THIS much, with so many very long days...AND so often?!
We would NOT allow this for truck drivers, pilots etc, due to SAFETY concerns for them and others, but for law enforcement employees, in this very demanding line of work, this can't be good.
S.F.’s top-paid employee made $900K. Here’s what every city worker gets paid
https://www.sfchronicle.com/projects/2026/san-francisco-employee-pay/?utm_source=marketing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=article-share&hash=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuc2ZjaHJvbmljbGUuY29tL3Byb2plY3RzLzIwMjYvc2FuLWZyYW5jaXNjby1lbXBsb3llZS1wYXkv&time=MTc4ODA1ODk2NTgxOQ
Excerpt from this SF Chronicle piece..
"SFPD has struggled with staffing levels in recent years, seeing the first year of staffing increase since the pandemic in 2025. A previous Chronicle analysis found officers working marathon shifts, including one sergeant who logged nearly 1,700 overtime hours in a single year.
City officials have proposed strategies to reduce overtime spending, such as staffing police units with retired officers, all while increasing funding for public safety agencies."
Minnesota is a state where government is one of the largest employers, and also the employer growing the most, with the biggest gains in net employees. This is a reflection of the amount of political will and dollars that flow into creating and protecting government jobs (especially around social safety net programs). Between union advocacy (and unions are strongest in government jobs, not the private sector), and DFL trifectas, and a general hostility to private businesses within the DFL, this is not a surprising result.
From the Star Tribune: https://www.startribune.com/minnesota-largest-employers-mayo-clinic-target-us-bank-wells-fargo-unitedhealth-medtronic/601634352
"The state government saw the biggest increase in employment on the list. The state added the most employees at 1,596 positions."
And that's just the state government. I've lost track of how many of my neighbors work for the City of Minneapolis or Hennepin County, or non-profits that provide services to those entities.
So the pay increases are not surprising.
Salary freeze, anyone? Austerity is not a dirty word.