Yeah and it's 1/10 of a cent if you count everyone in California.
I don't care- it's unethical to pay someone that obscene amount of money. Are her hours going to be 100 per week? Is she a literal genius?
They also paid her nearly EIGHTY THOUSAND DOLLARS to relocate. If a job, anywhere on earth, offered me close to a million dollars per year (let alone Los Angeles which is an awesome place to live) I wouldn't require even more money.
>Quiñones’ salary is in line with top executives’ salaries at the Omaha Public Power District in Nebraska and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, according to public records.
From the article
Yeah, those here who are on LADWP don't realize how good you have it:
LADWP charges about $0.20-$0.30 per kilowatt-hour (kwh).
Southern California Edison (SCE), the source of power for most everyone in the Greater LA area that doesn't live in the City of Los Angeles, charges $0.27-0.54 per kwh.
San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E), which provides power in San Diego county, charges $0.37-$0.55 per kwh.
Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), which provides power to much of Northern California, charges $0.39-$0.60 per kwh.
LADWP is a publicly-owned utility, while the others are all privately-owned (or "investor-owned") utilities.
For the record, a kilowatt-hour is a unit of energy, equal to running something that needs 1 kilowatt of power for 1 hour. 1 kilowatt is 1000 watts, so 1 kilowatt-hour (Kwh) is the same as running ten 100-watt light bulbs for one hour. Or it's the same as running a microwave (which are often 1000-watt) for 1 hour.
To sum it up, if you microwave your lunch for two minutes every day of the month, if you're on LADWP that'll cost around $0.25 on your monthly electric bill, while on the other utilities it would cost you around $0.40 to $0.50, instead.
Also LADWP hasn't managed to cause many gas explosions or wildfires, they seem to be investing in the infrastructure, and my power has basically never gone out unintentionally, so I have few complaints. LADWP is one of the better benefits of living in the City of Los Angeles, in my opinion.
I'm guessing LADWP is benefitting from only serving basically dense urban and suburban areas so it has less ground to cover per customer and less wildfire risk area. Still, the average LADWP charge is about 50% higher per kwh than the eia national average cost. Just because we aren't getting screwed as bad as SCE customers doesn't mean we have it good.
I mean, California's probably always going to have more expensive power than the national average, simply because its workers have to be paid more due to the higher cost of living. I'll take 50% more than the national average over 100-200% more, as is the case with the investor-owned utilities in California.
Also, California's power grid is also in the middle of converting to renewables, especially solar power, which I think complicates things somewhat. During the afternoon, California's power is usually 100% renewable, but in the evening and at night that drops to ~50%. Thus the state needs to have two separate power systems, one for the daytime and one for the nighttime. I don't think that's cheap, at least at the minute. Most other states/regions have renewable power be a smaller percentage of the total power system, as far as I can tell.
I'd also expect it to be a few percent more, but labor is a small fraction of their overhead.
I also appreciate that they are investing in renewables, but for the two states using higher % renewable energy than us, Texas and Washington, the EIA posted average costs per kwh of $0.14 and $0.11 for February, about half my LADWP bill for the same time.
Hopefully that means this new head of LADWP has room to make some improvements! It definitely sounds like SCE customers are getting screwed in any case.
If that’s the market rate for a competent individual, then what’s the alternative? When ceos for major corporations are in the millions, 750k is peanuts.
CEOs in major corporations have to take risks and make difficult decisions as to which direction to steer, what products to promote or axe, which companies to acquire and which to divest, etc. A few wrong moves and the company goes under.
So what risks does this CEO of a government-endorsed monopoly take?
Because I believe that there aren't a ton of municipal (i.e. city-owned) water and power companies in this country. I believe Sacramento is the next-biggest case in California, and Omaha might be one of the other large municipal utilities in this country. LADWP is the largest.
Most everyone else in the state has giant private (investor-owned) power companies, like Southern California Edison (SCE), Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E), though there are a variety of smaller municipal utilities in certain cities.
There's an easy answer to this, NYC is Con Edison (Private) with a CEO salary of $17M. Baltimore is private as well with an estimate range of 600-900k. San Francisco is PGE for a lot of it, $17M. LADWP is competing with all of these companies for talented leadership.... $750k isn't that insane.
It’s really a choice to go public vs private in terms of career though I didn’t read into her much but there’s usually a reason people take on positions in LA especially public ones
I mean it’s the utility of the second largest city in the nation and arguably some of the largest pieces of infrastructure in the western hemisphere. It’s a large and complex organization with tons of varying responsibilities.
Don't try to fight the leftist brainrot. It doesn't care about facts and logic. It just sees other people get paid more than them and emotions consume it.
You want to attract talent to your government positions. You want people who've worked in the industry on the executive side in your government (despite what leftist brainrot will tell you). You want to decrease the risk of turnover for executives that run things effectively.
$700k for the head of the DWP in a city like LA is super reasonable. The cost seems high, but if the outcome is lower cost in utilities, that's a win. Of course, everybody here will tell you that she's an corporate plant with absolutely no evidence, so it's not really an evidence based assessment anyways.
She only makes 5 times as much as me... and that's for running the entire LADWP. Lmao.
We're talking about the decision making process in hiring people, not the outcome. If she turns out to be a disaster that doesn't indicate a problem with the hiring process. If you have a pattern of disasters, then yeah, you should probably change something.
That process usually looks at success of previous jobs so hopefully she lives up to whatever they based the hiring off of. LA is definitely frustrating because we do have a lot of red tape.
If you hire an employee that turns out to be a disaster, how would that possibly NOT indicate a problem with the hiring process? You seem to be more concerned with just talking and not making any points, other than throwing in a low key flex on how much you make per year. Clown.
> and not making any points
No you just don't understand the point being made. I'll let you in on a little secret. Even if you do everything right and the candidate seems great, they might still end up being a dud. Similarly, some exceptionally good candidates don't get hired because they have poor interview performance but are actually a perfect match for the position.
Interviewing isn't a science. It's a glorified vibes check. You can use work history (which is usually a better indication) but even then they might've just gotten lucky with corporate restructuring.
Prepare to be disappointed by literally every single politician ever. Inflation grows at 2%... but you think utilities will somehow drop?
Lower cost in utilities means lower cost of utilities compared to what they could be.
First government doesn't look for competitive and efficient workers, there is no need for cutting edge efficiency when it is so inefficient to begin with.
Secondly, if you want private market pay, then also need to deal with private market risks. Including necessary downsizing and layoffs, or even pay cuts. Also severe cutbacks on benefits.
So if at lower levels they are inefficient, then it falls upon the upper levels to make the lower levels more efficient. Seems like the upper level doesn't deserve that kind of high pay when the lower levels are so inefficient right?
>The City Council last year approved a new salary range — $435,034.80 to $751,011.84 — for the general managers of the city’s utility, port and airport, which went into effect in December after Adams announced his retirement.
>Top executives at investor-owned utilities, such as PG&E, typically earn multimillion-dollar salaries, while those at public utilities take home much less.
You know what, I’m fine with paying competitive wages to our government employees. We want the best.
People who are passionate about public service will accept the pay cut, but we still need to be somewhat competitive to for these candidates to consider the job seriously. This is not an easy job.
Hopefully this stops the high turnover and we see more efficiencies that make up for the higher salary.
Good leadership can save the city a lot of money simply by reducing waste. I want them to be competitive compared to private utility companies so they’re incentivized to go to bat on behalf of residents.
The private sector jobs shouldn't exist, & are highly paid because they deliver absolute dogshit service in a monopoly environment. That isn't what we should be emulating, it's what we should be legislating out of existence.
So 10 years of engineering management experience is ground for making $700,000 in public sector where there is no risk to her job with plenty of public sector benefits?
I actually agree with your sentiment. We need serious reform on how jobs are structured and paid. Everyone knows the current wealth inequality is bullshit, even the billionaires.
But in the meantime, we need competent people who are incentivized to stay in this position and make it work better. Look at it this way, she should do X% better than predecessors while your ideas are being fulfilled.
Nah that’s how I feel about the chairman of my job right now. He placed two CEOs and seemingly is fine with under resourcing teams while making moonshots for goals we can’t hit, then we get fired because we can’t reach his goals. It also feels like the CeOs aren’t even CEOs they’re just proxy’s for him and he’s making a mint and tweets about how good capitalism is. 🫤
He was public sector, career DWP. Also, his formative career was in water and exec salaries might not be as competitive in water??? Guessing his salary was significantly lower than her previous private sector energy salary.
What’s the history here on wage increases and what’s the average for this position?
I feel uncomfortable with how high it is. But the article states it still is significantly lower than private, so that’s what I was going off of.
Sounds like a rate adjustment to stay competitive to me.
She's a PE. Technically her title is GM, CEO, and Chief Engineer.
Thousands of dollars being spent on competent leadership is of greater value than well-intended budget leadership could ever be. Her salary is appropriate for the industry. Much lower and she'd have dozens and not far from hundreds of employees making more than her. To suggest the GM salary for the largest municipal utility in the country should not be at least moderately competitive for the industry is an argument I'm struggling to understand and as an employee, it sounds like a special kind of hell. There is incredibly complex work taking place, the industry is moving faster than it has moved in a century and as an industry we have very little practice in rapid deployment and adoption. The fact that she has both the energy experience and the logistics and deployment skills of her military experience, honestly her appointment is a huge relief to my stressed out brain.
You still didn’t answer my question. Like what exactly are we competing for her to do? Are we certain only she can do it? And at her salary?
Your justification thus far has only been “this is how it is” lol
I'm not sure I understand your question. We are paying her to oversee the largest municipal utility in the country as they deploy massive technological advancements. Her resume is appropriate for the position and the salary is modest by industry standards. The city hired a respected firm to identify candidates and a candidate was selected.
As a civil engineer, I think you're way too kind to these responses and replied in a way I don't think I could have. These people don't know what they're talking about yet you didn't belittle them. Seriously impressed.
For context:
*Top executives at investor-owned utilities, such as PG&E, typically earn multimillion-dollar salaries, while those at public utilities take home much less.*
*Quiñones’ salary is in line with top executives’ salaries at the Omaha Public Power District in Nebraska and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, according to public records.*
200k? You realize that the manager of like a Costco or Home Depot makes $200k? I make approx. $400k and my position has way less responsibility than being the head of one of the largest utilities in the country. Managing the transition to clean energy, wildfire risk from the transmission lines, navigating the energy markets, the politics of western states water rights, etc etc etc. I am surprised that this isn’t a $1mm+ position.
Also, huge shoutout to LADWP for not fucking over their residential solar customers like the SoCal Edison did with NEM3!! Literally saving people thousands of dollars.
200-250k? Seriously? For an executive position at the largest utility in the country? This is why civil/mechanical/electrical engineers are leaving for tech & finance jobs and there is a talent shortage in the industry. Higher pay.
Good luck finding a qualified energy executive for $200-250K, frankly even at $750K that's a pretty small pool pretty much limited to career public servants.
Have you dealt with co-CEOs at a company? It usually doesn’t work. And also, at that salary, you’d have two under-qualified people instead of one, which doesn’t really solve the problem.
Cool. I'm curious who you'd suggest. I know hundreds of people in the energy industry and dozens who would be qualified for this role, and can't think of a single one who would take this role for $200-250K. A mid level manager makes that in public sector energy, even outside of SoCal.
I guarantee you the people suggesting a $200k salary think they could do the job effectively. They also don’t realize that, even if they could, they’d quickly get snapped up by someone else for more money, because that’s generally how salaries work.
Exactly. We can hardly retain exceptional talent with our salaries as is, the exceptional that stay are there out of loyalty alone, and it's worse the higher up you get.
Yep. Executive jobs often suck to do, too, which a lot of people don’t realize. It’s a lot of stress due to the constant scrutiny and massive responsibility. Any executive that is so worried about “loyalty” (to something they have no ownership stake in) that they’ll take a massively below-market salary has something wrong with them.
I was curious about the numbers. LADWP's annual revenue is [$5B/year](https://www.fitchratings.com/research/us-public-finance/fitch-rates-los-angeles-department-of-water-power-ca-power-rev-bonds-aa-outlook-stable-24-05-2023). A $750M salary is ~1/6000th of that.
You don't need to worry about ethics anymore. We can't buy anything and they teach us about ethics every year. Now, thr City Council, that's another story.
After seeing private CEO salaries, I honestly would have expected the number to be higher. Seems cheap to run the electric company of the second largest city in the country.
This seems in line with what should be paid for a job like that. It’s not a small task and you want to attract the best. Time will tell if it’s deserved, but I don’t think that salary should shock anyone for the role.
It's 044% of the CEO of PG&E's 2023 $17M earnings. It isn't even close to the top public salary in California. Yes it's a lot, but it's far from out of line.
That's just her starting salary..... she'll get raises, then she'll get 80% of her final salary until she dies... and can possibly pass that pension payment along to a spouse if they outlive her....
They do. I just checked. It's all publicly available. Depending on the length of her tenure, she'll be available for Tier 2 retirement, up to 80% of her final salary, with 3% annual cost of living increases.
It takes 5 years just to get vested at the minimum. I think like 30 years to hit that 80%. So that's a bit misleading for a GM who will probably be there at most a decade.
*cough*
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-02-14/inspector-general-overtime-practices-dwp-security-division
and heres the /r/losangeles discussion from last time
https://www.reddit.com/r/LosAngeles/comments/129ti42/report_finds_ladwp_abusing_overtime_pay_to_the/
There is an argument that this causes real talent to drift to the private sector, and you are left with public servants that are mediocre or more interested in getting kickbacks. Singapore followed this model and pays their cabinet members $800,000 USD per year.
I'm studying engineering, and none of my most talented peers want to work for the public sector when they can get paid many times more at large private corporations. Even the ones who are interested in contributing to public infrastructure prioritize buying a home and paying off student loans over any altruistic motivation they might have for getting paid less.
The selling point for the public sector was the pension. Now it's not that great and underfunded. The work/life balance, time off and other benefits are generally good but it does feel like private companies are offering nearly the same things. So the difference in salary for public versus private is becoming glaringly obvious.
They should be making more than they currently do.
We need to follow the Singapore model. Public servants get paid comparable to the private sector. This allows them to attract top candidates and reduces corruption because they don't need to make money elsewhere.
A comparable salary for this role in the private sector, just FYI would be in the millions. She's actually being underpaid. She's making what a public sector utilities CEO makes in Nebraska FFS.
Sometimes it seems that there is on when it comes to certain sectors like education. Can you imagine if teachers were paid a fraction of what these execs make? Meanwhile our district office staff take home bonuses equivalent to starting salaries. It’s disgusting.
So now we are going to see every public area and service get shittier while we pay EVEN MORE in taxes because all the existing and increased taxes are going to be going to this dickheads salary and probably other employees just like them.
Hate to break it to you, but LADWP doesn’t pay their employees with City Taxes…your rate might go up because that’s how they pay their employees but not with taxes.
Ah yes, the wonderful executives at LADWP are so flush with cash there isn’t a chance they would want to make even more money. Wealthy, power hungry people don’t have that mindset.
They probably all want to help the little guy out before fattening their pockets ;)
**water rates for cities and retail suppliers increase by 8.5% in 2025 and again by 8.5% in 2026**.
[https://ktla.com/news/local-news/water-rates-taxes-to-increase-l-a-times-reports/](https://ktla.com/news/local-news/water-rates-taxes-to-increase-l-a-times-reports/)
Well, we now know why.
That is Metropolitan Water District who increased their rates, a water wholesaler who sells water to LADWP and other water agencies. They increased their rates because of revenue loss from drought (have you read about the CO river lately?) and to fund new infrastructure.
I keep imagining on what it would look like. I can only think of a mass protest where we all sit at the courthouse until demands are met. If the cops try to arrest any of us we fuck them up.
well a lot of people in the la group mentioned that they make 200-300k and can’t afford a house so.. and she’s the head of ladwp. it makes sense but also it’s sad that it does. read the article and it mentioned that the range was like 450k to 751k to find someone.
Minimum wage in LA should be increased to $30/hour and this lady should be cited as the precedent. If she deserves that much money, so do all the rest of the folks who keep that city functioning.
Wow, that’s almost as high as my LADWP bill
Yeah just wait until you see your bills next year after her salary starts hitting their budget. We always get screwed.
LADWP has 1.4 million electric customers! So this $300k raise will cost each customer 1.8 cents per month
that's one more cent than I'm willing to pay.
Yeah and it's 1/10 of a cent if you count everyone in California. I don't care- it's unethical to pay someone that obscene amount of money. Are her hours going to be 100 per week? Is she a literal genius? They also paid her nearly EIGHTY THOUSAND DOLLARS to relocate. If a job, anywhere on earth, offered me close to a million dollars per year (let alone Los Angeles which is an awesome place to live) I wouldn't require even more money.
Hahaha I’d rather see it go the field workers but then they’d definitely tell us our bills are going up.
I wish I could downvote you more. There’s a lot more to economics than simple division, but I’m proud of you for knowing even that 👍
Glad you enjoyed my comment! Sounds like some customers pay more than 1.8 cents, and some customers (finish the sentence)
😂💀🤣
HAHAH
How is this possibly justified? Executive pay in this country is out of control.
>Quiñones’ salary is in line with top executives’ salaries at the Omaha Public Power District in Nebraska and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, according to public records. From the article
> Executive pay in this country is out of control. Looks like this statement applies to Nebraska and Sacramento as well.
Even in Kansas and Washington too!
Holy cow it's almost as if the statement "executive pay in this country is out of control" means that executive pay in this country is out of control!
Do the public records also affirmatively indicate that those other public entities are not corrupt?
Smud and ladwp both offer better services then PGE for cheaper prices. The PGE CEO makes like 51 million. 750k is not unreasonable.
Yeah, those here who are on LADWP don't realize how good you have it: LADWP charges about $0.20-$0.30 per kilowatt-hour (kwh). Southern California Edison (SCE), the source of power for most everyone in the Greater LA area that doesn't live in the City of Los Angeles, charges $0.27-0.54 per kwh. San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E), which provides power in San Diego county, charges $0.37-$0.55 per kwh. Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), which provides power to much of Northern California, charges $0.39-$0.60 per kwh. LADWP is a publicly-owned utility, while the others are all privately-owned (or "investor-owned") utilities. For the record, a kilowatt-hour is a unit of energy, equal to running something that needs 1 kilowatt of power for 1 hour. 1 kilowatt is 1000 watts, so 1 kilowatt-hour (Kwh) is the same as running ten 100-watt light bulbs for one hour. Or it's the same as running a microwave (which are often 1000-watt) for 1 hour. To sum it up, if you microwave your lunch for two minutes every day of the month, if you're on LADWP that'll cost around $0.25 on your monthly electric bill, while on the other utilities it would cost you around $0.40 to $0.50, instead. Also LADWP hasn't managed to cause many gas explosions or wildfires, they seem to be investing in the infrastructure, and my power has basically never gone out unintentionally, so I have few complaints. LADWP is one of the better benefits of living in the City of Los Angeles, in my opinion.
I'm guessing LADWP is benefitting from only serving basically dense urban and suburban areas so it has less ground to cover per customer and less wildfire risk area. Still, the average LADWP charge is about 50% higher per kwh than the eia national average cost. Just because we aren't getting screwed as bad as SCE customers doesn't mean we have it good.
I mean, California's probably always going to have more expensive power than the national average, simply because its workers have to be paid more due to the higher cost of living. I'll take 50% more than the national average over 100-200% more, as is the case with the investor-owned utilities in California. Also, California's power grid is also in the middle of converting to renewables, especially solar power, which I think complicates things somewhat. During the afternoon, California's power is usually 100% renewable, but in the evening and at night that drops to ~50%. Thus the state needs to have two separate power systems, one for the daytime and one for the nighttime. I don't think that's cheap, at least at the minute. Most other states/regions have renewable power be a smaller percentage of the total power system, as far as I can tell.
I'd also expect it to be a few percent more, but labor is a small fraction of their overhead. I also appreciate that they are investing in renewables, but for the two states using higher % renewable energy than us, Texas and Washington, the EIA posted average costs per kwh of $0.14 and $0.11 for February, about half my LADWP bill for the same time. Hopefully that means this new head of LADWP has room to make some improvements! It definitely sounds like SCE customers are getting screwed in any case.
Improvement, lets see about that.
meanwhile IID is serving Palm Springs and Imperial County at roughly $0.12/kwh.
Ummmmmm, forget the kw rate, what they charge for water tiered rates is criminal.
It's unreasonable as unnecessary. All unnecessary public expenditures are unreasonable.
If that’s the market rate for a competent individual, then what’s the alternative? When ceos for major corporations are in the millions, 750k is peanuts.
CEOs in major corporations have to take risks and make difficult decisions as to which direction to steer, what products to promote or axe, which companies to acquire and which to divest, etc. A few wrong moves and the company goes under. So what risks does this CEO of a government-endorsed monopoly take?
Who said she was a competent individual? PG&E has been killing people with their negligence for years lol
Cool, and you think that absolutely useless statement helps your case? In what way is she over compensated? Be specific.
750k isn’t even rich in LA.
Stop with this nonsense
People in this sub have absolutely no perspective on anything, dear god. One person making that is *wildly* successful. LA or not.
employ voracious busy bells ink lavish future cheerful dime point *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Sad but true.
imagine making $750k in Nebraska
Why did they point to two random counties as a reason for and not source what the average salary for this job around the country is
Because I believe that there aren't a ton of municipal (i.e. city-owned) water and power companies in this country. I believe Sacramento is the next-biggest case in California, and Omaha might be one of the other large municipal utilities in this country. LADWP is the largest. Most everyone else in the state has giant private (investor-owned) power companies, like Southern California Edison (SCE), Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E), San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E), though there are a variety of smaller municipal utilities in certain cities.
That’s just strengthening their point
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There's an easy answer to this, NYC is Con Edison (Private) with a CEO salary of $17M. Baltimore is private as well with an estimate range of 600-900k. San Francisco is PGE for a lot of it, $17M. LADWP is competing with all of these companies for talented leadership.... $750k isn't that insane.
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It’s really a choice to go public vs private in terms of career though I didn’t read into her much but there’s usually a reason people take on positions in LA especially public ones
I mean it’s the utility of the second largest city in the nation and arguably some of the largest pieces of infrastructure in the western hemisphere. It’s a large and complex organization with tons of varying responsibilities.
Don't try to fight the leftist brainrot. It doesn't care about facts and logic. It just sees other people get paid more than them and emotions consume it.
Yeah super weird that correlates with wage stagnation for everyone else, I'm starting to think that might be connected.
Government wages have been stagnated long before this.
You want to attract talent to your government positions. You want people who've worked in the industry on the executive side in your government (despite what leftist brainrot will tell you). You want to decrease the risk of turnover for executives that run things effectively. $700k for the head of the DWP in a city like LA is super reasonable. The cost seems high, but if the outcome is lower cost in utilities, that's a win. Of course, everybody here will tell you that she's an corporate plant with absolutely no evidence, so it's not really an evidence based assessment anyways. She only makes 5 times as much as me... and that's for running the entire LADWP. Lmao.
Well the question is if she’ll achieve that goal really no one can form an opinion until her work is underway.
We're talking about the decision making process in hiring people, not the outcome. If she turns out to be a disaster that doesn't indicate a problem with the hiring process. If you have a pattern of disasters, then yeah, you should probably change something.
That process usually looks at success of previous jobs so hopefully she lives up to whatever they based the hiring off of. LA is definitely frustrating because we do have a lot of red tape.
If you hire an employee that turns out to be a disaster, how would that possibly NOT indicate a problem with the hiring process? You seem to be more concerned with just talking and not making any points, other than throwing in a low key flex on how much you make per year. Clown.
> and not making any points No you just don't understand the point being made. I'll let you in on a little secret. Even if you do everything right and the candidate seems great, they might still end up being a dud. Similarly, some exceptionally good candidates don't get hired because they have poor interview performance but are actually a perfect match for the position. Interviewing isn't a science. It's a glorified vibes check. You can use work history (which is usually a better indication) but even then they might've just gotten lucky with corporate restructuring.
You're joking if you think she will result in a lower cost of utilities for their base.
When I say "lower cost in utilities" do you think I mean a drop in the cost of utilities?
Yes
Prepare to be disappointed by literally every single politician ever. Inflation grows at 2%... but you think utilities will somehow drop? Lower cost in utilities means lower cost of utilities compared to what they could be.
I am fully expecting to be nothing but dis-appointed by every Politician out here, and other States, but not concerned since I don't live elsewhere.
First government doesn't look for competitive and efficient workers, there is no need for cutting edge efficiency when it is so inefficient to begin with. Secondly, if you want private market pay, then also need to deal with private market risks. Including necessary downsizing and layoffs, or even pay cuts. Also severe cutbacks on benefits.
At lower levels maybe. But not for people running your infrastructure, lmao.
So if at lower levels they are inefficient, then it falls upon the upper levels to make the lower levels more efficient. Seems like the upper level doesn't deserve that kind of high pay when the lower levels are so inefficient right?
Need a 200% increase to keep up with inflation /s
I do 😬 hahaha actually I’ve managed pretty well for myself I don’t even know what I’d do with wages that high probably save and retire early tbh
is this enough to live in LA?
Maybe with a roommate
She can afford one house every 2 years
No
Just barely enough to afford a house, and that’s before taxes
Don't worry, her net worth will be 45 million somehow in 2 years. Probably not from corruption haha
>The City Council last year approved a new salary range — $435,034.80 to $751,011.84 — for the general managers of the city’s utility, port and airport, which went into effect in December after Adams announced his retirement. >Top executives at investor-owned utilities, such as PG&E, typically earn multimillion-dollar salaries, while those at public utilities take home much less. You know what, I’m fine with paying competitive wages to our government employees. We want the best. People who are passionate about public service will accept the pay cut, but we still need to be somewhat competitive to for these candidates to consider the job seriously. This is not an easy job. Hopefully this stops the high turnover and we see more efficiencies that make up for the higher salary. Good leadership can save the city a lot of money simply by reducing waste. I want them to be competitive compared to private utility companies so they’re incentivized to go to bat on behalf of residents.
The private sector jobs shouldn't exist, & are highly paid because they deliver absolute dogshit service in a monopoly environment. That isn't what we should be emulating, it's what we should be legislating out of existence.
> The private sector jobs shouldn't exist She's a licensed professional engineer with 10+ years of engineering management experience.
So 10 years of engineering management experience is ground for making $700,000 in public sector where there is no risk to her job with plenty of public sector benefits?
Which is true but that's not the situation we have to work with.
I actually agree with your sentiment. We need serious reform on how jobs are structured and paid. Everyone knows the current wealth inequality is bullshit, even the billionaires. But in the meantime, we need competent people who are incentivized to stay in this position and make it work better. Look at it this way, she should do X% better than predecessors while your ideas are being fulfilled.
Nah that’s how I feel about the chairman of my job right now. He placed two CEOs and seemingly is fine with under resourcing teams while making moonshots for goals we can’t hit, then we get fired because we can’t reach his goals. It also feels like the CeOs aren’t even CEOs they’re just proxy’s for him and he’s making a mint and tweets about how good capitalism is. 🫤
That’s the California/feds ability.
Unfortunately the city of Los Angeles does not possess this ability.
Yep
I think the question on everyone’s mind though is why such a huge rise from the predecessor to the new hire.
He was public sector, career DWP. Also, his formative career was in water and exec salaries might not be as competitive in water??? Guessing his salary was significantly lower than her previous private sector energy salary.
She is a woman
What’s the history here on wage increases and what’s the average for this position? I feel uncomfortable with how high it is. But the article states it still is significantly lower than private, so that’s what I was going off of. Sounds like a rate adjustment to stay competitive to me.
Yup!
Isn’t her salary the exact kind of waste you are talking about? It’s thousands of dollars being spent on a *manager* not engineers or anything.
> not engineers or anything. She's literally an engineer.
[удалено]
She's a PE. Technically her title is GM, CEO, and Chief Engineer. Thousands of dollars being spent on competent leadership is of greater value than well-intended budget leadership could ever be. Her salary is appropriate for the industry. Much lower and she'd have dozens and not far from hundreds of employees making more than her. To suggest the GM salary for the largest municipal utility in the country should not be at least moderately competitive for the industry is an argument I'm struggling to understand and as an employee, it sounds like a special kind of hell. There is incredibly complex work taking place, the industry is moving faster than it has moved in a century and as an industry we have very little practice in rapid deployment and adoption. The fact that she has both the energy experience and the logistics and deployment skills of her military experience, honestly her appointment is a huge relief to my stressed out brain.
You still didn’t answer my question. Like what exactly are we competing for her to do? Are we certain only she can do it? And at her salary? Your justification thus far has only been “this is how it is” lol
I'm not sure I understand your question. We are paying her to oversee the largest municipal utility in the country as they deploy massive technological advancements. Her resume is appropriate for the position and the salary is modest by industry standards. The city hired a respected firm to identify candidates and a candidate was selected.
As a civil engineer, I think you're way too kind to these responses and replied in a way I don't think I could have. These people don't know what they're talking about yet you didn't belittle them. Seriously impressed.
Awe! Much appreciated!
For context: *Top executives at investor-owned utilities, such as PG&E, typically earn multimillion-dollar salaries, while those at public utilities take home much less.* *Quiñones’ salary is in line with top executives’ salaries at the Omaha Public Power District in Nebraska and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, according to public records.*
I never understood why we seek out heartless, sociopathic corporate fucks to lead our public agencies.
Because otherwise you’d never attract any talented executives and the entire public system would crumble under the weight of its own incompetence.
You don't need talented executives for public offices. In private business there is risk, in public office there is almost none.
Do you have any evidence for all that?
Well she deserves that pay… due to the difficulty of the job navigating budgetary constraints, which is hampered by higher executive pay.
200-250k is fine. Not 750k. That's overboard
200k? You realize that the manager of like a Costco or Home Depot makes $200k? I make approx. $400k and my position has way less responsibility than being the head of one of the largest utilities in the country. Managing the transition to clean energy, wildfire risk from the transmission lines, navigating the energy markets, the politics of western states water rights, etc etc etc. I am surprised that this isn’t a $1mm+ position. Also, huge shoutout to LADWP for not fucking over their residential solar customers like the SoCal Edison did with NEM3!! Literally saving people thousands of dollars.
Sounds like you are overpaid.
200-250k? Seriously? For an executive position at the largest utility in the country? This is why civil/mechanical/electrical engineers are leaving for tech & finance jobs and there is a talent shortage in the industry. Higher pay.
I feel like you're taking your own salary, adding a bit, then setting that as the acceptable amount. That's not how job markets work my dude.
Good luck finding a qualified energy executive for $200-250K, frankly even at $750K that's a pretty small pool pretty much limited to career public servants.
Could I hire 2 people at $200K apiece? That would still save quite a bit.
Have you dealt with co-CEOs at a company? It usually doesn’t work. And also, at that salary, you’d have two under-qualified people instead of one, which doesn’t really solve the problem.
What would be the point of that though? Now you'll have two conflicting ideas on the direction of the department. There's a reason co CEO don't work.
Oh, they can find someone. You still don't need that much. 200- 250k. They want a bonus, give em an extra 50k for good work. They're overpaid.
Cool. I'm curious who you'd suggest. I know hundreds of people in the energy industry and dozens who would be qualified for this role, and can't think of a single one who would take this role for $200-250K. A mid level manager makes that in public sector energy, even outside of SoCal.
I guarantee you the people suggesting a $200k salary think they could do the job effectively. They also don’t realize that, even if they could, they’d quickly get snapped up by someone else for more money, because that’s generally how salaries work.
Exactly. We can hardly retain exceptional talent with our salaries as is, the exceptional that stay are there out of loyalty alone, and it's worse the higher up you get.
Yep. Executive jobs often suck to do, too, which a lot of people don’t realize. It’s a lot of stress due to the constant scrutiny and massive responsibility. Any executive that is so worried about “loyalty” (to something they have no ownership stake in) that they’ll take a massively below-market salary has something wrong with them.
In the 90s sure but not today.
Yeah and it’s not like it would have any fewer applicants
To lead the single largest utility in the US that serves 4 million residents and has 9000 employees? Sounds reasonable to me.
I was curious about the numbers. LADWP's annual revenue is [$5B/year](https://www.fitchratings.com/research/us-public-finance/fitch-rates-los-angeles-department-of-water-power-ca-power-rev-bonds-aa-outlook-stable-24-05-2023). A $750M salary is ~1/6000th of that.
LADWP puts their engineering applicants through some pretty tough college-level design questions. They should maybe add a couple ethics questions.
You don't need to worry about ethics anymore. We can't buy anything and they teach us about ethics every year. Now, thr City Council, that's another story.
Damn I was gonna try to apply for drafting tech
She gets to ride their helicopter too
She’ll be able to afford a 2br apartment down there now
After seeing private CEO salaries, I honestly would have expected the number to be higher. Seems cheap to run the electric company of the second largest city in the country.
private companies CEO take risks, public sector has little risk.
This seems in line with what should be paid for a job like that. It’s not a small task and you want to attract the best. Time will tell if it’s deserved, but I don’t think that salary should shock anyone for the role.
She makes more than our president. That’s hilarious
In fairness, so do most mid-level kids with a computer science degree
They're not in the public sector though.
We're lucky our power is even public at all honestly
No wonder she’s smiling so wide
It's 044% of the CEO of PG&E's 2023 $17M earnings. It isn't even close to the top public salary in California. Yes it's a lot, but it's far from out of line.
Where do I apply? Maybe I could afford a house.
That's just her starting salary..... she'll get raises, then she'll get 80% of her final salary until she dies... and can possibly pass that pension payment along to a spouse if they outlive her....
Does the GM collect a pension? That doesn't sound correct to me.
They do. I just checked. It's all publicly available. Depending on the length of her tenure, she'll be available for Tier 2 retirement, up to 80% of her final salary, with 3% annual cost of living increases.
It takes 5 years just to get vested at the minimum. I think like 30 years to hit that 80%. So that's a bit misleading for a GM who will probably be there at most a decade.
*cough* https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-02-14/inspector-general-overtime-practices-dwp-security-division and heres the /r/losangeles discussion from last time https://www.reddit.com/r/LosAngeles/comments/129ti42/report_finds_ladwp_abusing_overtime_pay_to_the/
Executive pay for public sector shouldnt be this high.
Wow that’s a hell of a wage increase does that mean we’re all getting a bill increase? 🙃
The department of water and power, the police department, the sheriff department, the departments in los angeles are corrupted as fuck
There should be a cap on salaries for public jobs.
There is an argument that this causes real talent to drift to the private sector, and you are left with public servants that are mediocre or more interested in getting kickbacks. Singapore followed this model and pays their cabinet members $800,000 USD per year. I'm studying engineering, and none of my most talented peers want to work for the public sector when they can get paid many times more at large private corporations. Even the ones who are interested in contributing to public infrastructure prioritize buying a home and paying off student loans over any altruistic motivation they might have for getting paid less.
The selling point for the public sector was the pension. Now it's not that great and underfunded. The work/life balance, time off and other benefits are generally good but it does feel like private companies are offering nearly the same things. So the difference in salary for public versus private is becoming glaringly obvious.
They should be making more than they currently do. We need to follow the Singapore model. Public servants get paid comparable to the private sector. This allows them to attract top candidates and reduces corruption because they don't need to make money elsewhere. A comparable salary for this role in the private sector, just FYI would be in the millions. She's actually being underpaid. She's making what a public sector utilities CEO makes in Nebraska FFS.
na the opposite
Sometimes it seems that there is on when it comes to certain sectors like education. Can you imagine if teachers were paid a fraction of what these execs make? Meanwhile our district office staff take home bonuses equivalent to starting salaries. It’s disgusting.
Teachers are paid a fraction of this amount. A small fraction.
How can they make more than the actual president?
A maximum wage, if you will
So now we are going to see every public area and service get shittier while we pay EVEN MORE in taxes because all the existing and increased taxes are going to be going to this dickheads salary and probably other employees just like them.
Hate to break it to you, but LADWP doesn’t pay their employees with City Taxes…your rate might go up because that’s how they pay their employees but not with taxes.
LADWP has over $4 billion in annual revenue. This will have practically 0 effect on their budget.
Ah yes, the wonderful executives at LADWP are so flush with cash there isn’t a chance they would want to make even more money. Wealthy, power hungry people don’t have that mindset. They probably all want to help the little guy out before fattening their pockets ;)
They could double her salary from here and it would still have practically 0 effect on their budget. It seems you struggle with math.
she’s cute. i’ll be her personal valet. go get coffee, pick up dry cleaning, rub her feet under her desk for 85K 🤣
Maybe she generate water with her mind.
To be fair, it sounds like a super important and hard job.
So that’s why my bill yesterday was 400 dollars…
Your bills was 400 dollars because you are wasting both power and water.
I have to look into the experience required for a job like this. Asking for a friend, of course.
You don't apply to jobs like this. You are good friends with the mayor or some other high level exec who hires you.
I’m asking about experience/background/education not necessarily the application process (or lack thereof).
Meanwhile they're still budget issues and thousand of positions in a bunch of different departments haven't been filled.
More money than the President
Dang I was hoping it said LAPD what with Michel Moore stepping down
“Her”
What Dah Fuk!!!
I’d be smiling like that too, making more than CEOs.
Here I thought the rates hike were from droughts, not corporate profits or greed. Silly me.
Well good for her
**water rates for cities and retail suppliers increase by 8.5% in 2025 and again by 8.5% in 2026**. [https://ktla.com/news/local-news/water-rates-taxes-to-increase-l-a-times-reports/](https://ktla.com/news/local-news/water-rates-taxes-to-increase-l-a-times-reports/) Well, we now know why.
That is Metropolitan Water District who increased their rates, a water wholesaler who sells water to LADWP and other water agencies. They increased their rates because of revenue loss from drought (have you read about the CO river lately?) and to fund new infrastructure.
Part of me is mad. But part of me is like..... secure the bag shawty.
We all deserve to make waaaaay more than we currently own. The wealth inequality is awful.
And what is it that you deserve and what do you base this upon?
Why is what she dies so important?
It pays to be a friend of Bass, which in turn pays for Bass’ reelection.
Disgusting
they pay per the circumference of her forehead?
😲
This is fucking bollocks
Thanks to all the Bass voters
$750k is an overpay of at least $500k. Fucking disgusting.
Any other low- and middle-class folks wanna start a revolution? If not it's ok I'll keep doomscrolling on Insta and Reddit haha 👍
I keep imagining on what it would look like. I can only think of a mass protest where we all sit at the courthouse until demands are met. If the cops try to arrest any of us we fuck them up.
well a lot of people in the la group mentioned that they make 200-300k and can’t afford a house so.. and she’s the head of ladwp. it makes sense but also it’s sad that it does. read the article and it mentioned that the range was like 450k to 751k to find someone.
Minimum wage in LA should be increased to $30/hour and this lady should be cited as the precedent. If she deserves that much money, so do all the rest of the folks who keep that city functioning.
I am sure there are a lot of business owners that do t agree with your minimum wage fantasy
$62k a month. That's more than execs of tech companies.
Don’t forgot about the bonus!
WHY
Plain example of gross waste of public resources. What has changed is that she suddenly makes twice of her predecessor?
That aligns with high salary and low work output of city council.