The governor's staff is well-paid
I finally got ahold of Gov. Katie Hobbs' senior staff and salaries
By all accounts, every staff member on Governor Katie Hobbs’ senior staff is earning more money than the people who held those positions under Gov. Doug Ducey.
I’ve been writing about other elected offices in the state to find out who is on their respective staffs and how much they are earning from taxpayers and the governor’s office was the last office I needed for the first slate of stories before I can move into state agencies.
Hobbs’ salary is mandated by the state Constitution and she will earn $95,000 while occupying the Ninth Floor. Compared to other states, Arizona’s gubernatorial salary is on the lower end ranking 48th (we are State 48 after all) in 2021. The average salary of governors in the country is roughly $147,000, but while Arizona’s governor is locked in at $95,000 barring voters changing it, the staffers are not.
Hobbs’ second in command, Allie Bones, is making the most at $205,000. Arizona Agenda just wrote about Bones, the social worker and Bengals fan that is worth a read. I also spoke to her a couple of years ago for the Arizona Capitol Times before election denialism went berserk, which you can watch here.
Using the Arizona Republic’s salary database, which was last updated reflecting salary information through June of 2021, she is making significantly more than Daniel Scarpinato who was chief of staff at the time.
By comparison, Scarpinato was at $162,000. Before him, Kirk Adams made just under $170,000 when he left the position before 2019. Daniel Ruiz’s, Ducey’s third and final chief of staff, salary info in that role is not yet available yet since he took over in August of 2021, but he was earning $159,000 as COO.
It should be noted that the $170,000 Adams was making in 2018 adjusted for inflation would be about $201,000 today.
Bones made $153,000 at the SOS as of 2021.
Bo Dul, Hobbs’ general counsel, is paid second highest at $190,000. She made $150,000 at SOS before leaving and her Ninth Floor predecessor, Anni Foster (who is now on the Court of Appeals), made $147,000.
The lowest paid member of Hobbs’ staff of those I requested is their new public records coordinator who is earning $72,000 and just three others seen above are earning under six figures unlike the rest of her senior staff.
See the staff and salaries from other offices I’ve written about below:
Secretary of State Adrian Fontes
Attorney General Kris Mayes
Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne; updated list
Interesting to read & consider what isn’t being said here. Comparing past salaries to current salaries but, just stopping there feels like there are pieces being left out. It would have been awesome to see a comparison to past hiring climates & where cost of living was relatively. Also, which administrations had more women & minorities on staff? How much were they paid relative to their male and or non-minority team members? What were inflation rates like at that time for those individuals? How much were eggs??? Is there a part 2 coming?