SOUTH PORTLAND – The South Portland City Council has decided to pursue a raise for members of the board of education money school board members say they don’t want.

The decision was reached at a workshop session Monday, during which the council considered the report of a “blue-ribbon committee,” submitted June 18 following four months of debate regarding appropriate pay scales for elected and appointed officials in South Portland.

The one change ultimately recommended by the seven-member ad hoc committee was to boost school board stipends by $500, to $1,500 per year. The school board weighed in on that proposal at its July 8 meeting, dismissing the idea after just 10 minutes of discussion.

According to Superintendent Suzanne Godin, school board members “expressed gratitude” for the suggested pay hike, but said, “they really didn’t fell like it was worth going through a charter change.”

The City Council, however, felt otherwise. After 25 minutes of debate a lighting-quick workshop by City Council standards a majority agreed to conduct a formal vote at their Aug. 5 meeting that will send the question to voters. Assuming that vote prevails, the pay raise proposal will go on a ballot already packed with controversy, promising heavy traffic for an off-year election.

Also up for a vote, in addition to City Council seats currently held by Alan Livingston and Mayor Tom Blake, who said Monday he still has not decided whether to run again, is a land-use ordinance that seeks to regulate South Portland’s petroleum industry to prevent the import of so-called tar sands oil and a $10 million bond question to fund a new public works building.

Initially, councilors seemed prepared to let the committee report sit on a shelf, given that its one recommended change to the status quo was offered on a 5-2 vote.

“If I felt the report was overwhelmingly convincing one way or the other, then I might desire to send it to the voters, but I don’t really see that,” said Blake. “The report was somewhat split and divided, and I see sort of mixed emotions from the school board.”

However, Councilor Gerard Jalbert eventually swayed a majority of his peers, saying that as the council had accepted the committee report at its July 1 meeting, it was more or less obligated to act on its recommendations.

“It will be interesting to see what the general populace has to say,” agreed Councilor Patti Smith, who had initially adopted a wait-and-see stance on implementing any changes in pay.

“It was a small committee and a great process, but when you put things out to the people, sometimes you are surprised by what you get,” she said. “I think there is some value in kind of throwing up a trial balloon and seeing how people feel about this.”

Councilor Melissa Linscott questioned if, by sending the issue to voters, the council was essentially “forcing” the school board to accept a pay raise. However, on Jalbert’s suggestion, the council agreed the charter change sent to voters should read that school board members may receive stipends of “up to $1,500.” That, said Jalbert, will give the school board some flexibility regarding how much to pay itself.

If approved by votes, the potential for a higher school board stipend will take effect with the start of the next fiscal year on July 1, 2014.

Most councilors disagreed with the committee report on pay rates for the mayor and school board chairman. Although the mayorship is often described as a ceremonial position, the two most recent mayors of South Portland, Smith and Blake, agreed the job requires “twice as much time” as the duties of a rank-and-file city councilor. Still, while the council could have tweaked the charter change proposal further to add a higher rate, it elected to stick with the committee recommendation to retain the current pay scales, which provide no additional compensation for the leadership posts.

“They didn’t recommend it, so I don’t see any reason to add it in there,” said Councilor Michael Pock. “Personally, I think I’m making more than I deserve.”

During his campaign for office last fall, Pock had vowed not to accept the $3,000 stipend paid to city councilors. However, since his election he has learned that state labor laws do not allow him to refuse the pay. He has since made a new vow to find some way of donating the money back to the city.

Although most councilors expressed praise for the efforts of the blue-ribbon committee, Councilor Livingston did levy some harsh words, directed primarily at committee member Albert DiMillo.

At multiple City Council meetings during the past 18 months, while stumping against the council’s insurance benefit, DiMillo suggested councilors instead get a pay raise to as much as $5,000 per year, to help them purchase health coverage on their own. DiMillo later was named to the blue-ribbon committee and Livingston found fault with the fact that its final report advised against boosting council pay, while supporting a previous council vote to terminate the health plan effective Nov. 30.

“I find that he’s spoken out of both sides of his mouth, which is no surprise,” Livingston said of DiMillo.

Livingston then spread his ire to the rest of the committee. Although given a mandate to examine the total compensation package of all elected and appointed officials in the city, Livingston said the committee spent an inordinate amount of time debating health insurance coverage, an issue he claimed was settled and put to bed before the committee was created.

“That was already decided and yet they kept talking and talking about insurance, and that was not their task,” he said.

The committee report recommended allowing councilors the ability to buy into the city’s health insurance plan, at their own expense, essentially endorsing the change to come in November, when premiums for city councilors shift from 100 percent coverage by taxpayers to a 100 percent out-of-pocket expense.

A charter change is not required to allow councilors the ability to buy into the health plan. Under state law in place since 1969, council members are considered city employees for purposes of insurance coverage.

The blue-ribbon commission was constituted in March following a yearlong kerfuffle over the free health insurance coverage city councilors voted to grant themselves in 1977. That decision was not questioned until 2009, when some residents questioned the expense given ever-escalating rates. The benefit was again questioned in late 2011 by then-Mayor Rosemarie De Angelis. At the time, the council debated but quickly tabled the topic, prompting a lawsuit by DiMillo, who charged that the city charter, last amended in 1986, makes no mention of any compensation beyond an annual stipend.

DiMillo eventually dropped the suit in exchange for the council agreeing to again debate the issue in a public workshop session. On Sept. 5, 2012, the council voted 6-1 to end the insurance benefit effective with the November 2013 election. Only former councilor Tom Coward, now a Cumberland County commissioner, voted to retain the insurance package.

At the time, Coward was one of two councilors, along with Blake, who took the full family plan, at a cost to taxpayers of nearly $15,000. Blake still carries the family plan, while Jalbert has individual coverage. No other councilors currently accept the benefit.

From the start of the insurance fight in 2011, Blake called for the formation of an independent, blue-ribbon commission to review the total compensation package for elected and appointed officials. That call was finally heeded in March when the council directed City Manager Jim Gailey to hire a human resources professional to staff and lead the ad hoc group.

Gailey picked Michael Wing of Harpswell-based Human Resources/Labor Relations Consulting Service at $110 per hour, or $8,847 by the time the committee wrapped up its work. For the committee Wing selected David Canarie, Andy Charles, Brian Dearborn, Richard Rottkov, Carol Thorne and Natalie West, along with DiMillo, from a pool of 14 applicants to sit on the panel.

Two members of the panel did suggest a pay hike for city councilors to $4,000 was in order.

While councilor pay has not changed in South Portland in 27 years, only Portland pays its city councilors more, at $5,812. Westbrook councilors also make $3,000. Councilor compensation in other Maine cities ranges from $2,700 in Lewiston to $1,200 in Biddeford and Saco.