Wichita city manager gets two years of retroactive raises totaling $18,000

Wichita City Manager Robert Layton received an $18,426 pay bump Tuesday, with a majority of that money going into his retirement account.

The unanimous move by the City Council comes as two newcomers who have been critical of Layton’s performance are set to take office next week. Incoming city council members Maggie Ballard and Mike Hoheisel said during their campaigns that they are interested in replacing Layton. They will be sworn in at a Jan. 10 special meeting.

Layton, who has been the city’s top executive officer since 2009, had not received a raise since 2018. City Council members said he deferred raises due to an economic downturn in 2020.

Layton’s base salary is now $234,617 a year after Tuesday’s raise, he said. Some of the raise money went directly to his retirement account.

The salary increase awarded Tuesday will be applied retroactively for years 2019 and 2020. He will receive a one-time $8,741 payment to his retirement account for 2019 and an additional $9,250 in salary and retirement raises for 2020. Those represent raises of 3.4% in 2019 and 4% in 2020. The council has not yet acted on a raise for 2021.

City Council member Becky Tuttle, who called herself a “raving fan” of Layton, said the raises were given because of the manager’s performance based on written evaluations of Layton’s performance by Mayor Brandon Whipple and council members.

The council can vote to make the evaluations public but did not do so on Tuesday.

The vote came in the last council meeting for outgoing members Cindy Claycomb and Jared Cerullo.

Cerullo, who voted to approve Layton’s raise, was the lone representative to express any reservations about the pay increase.

He said he thinks Layton has “done a wonderful job for the city of Wichita.” But many in his district in southeast Wichita feel the manager’s salary is too high, he said.

“I am hearing overwhelmingly in my district from the people who are active the most, in terms of the manager’s salary, at what point is enough enough?” Cerullo said. “I get it that we have to stay competitive. We have to keep our manager’s salary competitive with the goals and the objectives that are placed in front of him or her.

“(But) after this raise, our manager will be making a quarter-million dollars a year,” Cerullo said. “And to many people, an overwhelming amount of people in District 3, that’s hard to fathom. It is hard to fathom. So I have to represent my people and make it known that this is tough. This is tough for them to accept.”

This story was originally published January 4, 2022 at 4:16 PM.