Camas OKs city administrator salary bump

The Camas City Council this week unanimously approved a salary bump for the city’s next city administrator, increasing the future administrator’s annual salary range from $165,000 to $198,000, to $173,000 to $205,000.

“It’s about a 4 percent increase,” Jennifer Gorsuch, the city’s administrative services director, told the Council on June 6.

The increase makes the city’s top pay scale just over $17,000 a month, Gorsuch said, adding that “city staff reviewed the salary range with the mayor and consultant and determined that … having a slightly higher increase will increase our odds of attracting high-caliber candidates.”

Camas Mayor Steve Hogan was expected to name a new city administrator in May, after city leaders and a consultancy group whittled 34 applicants from a nationwide search to the top four candidates.

Instead of naming a new administrator, however, Hogan said he wanted to keep the job open in the hope of finding an applicant with more city management experience.

“Camas is growing like a weed and it’s taking more and more talented staff to take care of everything we’re doing inside the city government,” Hogan told The Post-Record in late May. “(I would like to) change the description from city administrator to city administrator/city manager and then look at the salary ranges. City managers are a step above city administrators and are capable of running a city without a mayor as CEO.”