Connecticut’s chief justice wants to give $45,000 in raises to state judges, a move she says is needed because the judges have gone five years without a salary increase and because they are underpaid compared to judges in other states.
Chief Justice Chase T. Rogers proposed the increases over four years in a report to the state’s Commission on Judicial Compensation. The commission is expected to make a recommendation on her request in January. The legislature could vote on the proposal next year.
Under her recommendation, a superior court judge’s salary would increase from an average of about $147,000 annually to about $192,000, according to a report by television station WTNH. A national court organization ranks Connecticut 45th in the country for judges' pay, the report says.
Under her plan Connecticut Supreme Court judges would see their pay rise about $49,000 each over four years, from about $163,000 to about $212,000, according to The Day of New London.
The judicial pay raise plan, coming on the heels of more than $260,000 in controversial salary hikes that were given, and later suspended, to top officials in the state’s Department of Higher Education last week, is already drawing fire from some politicians in the state.
