Who are the top 25 highest-paid Miami Beach city employees? Search our database
Miami Beach’s highest-ranking firefighters made more than their counterparts in the police department last year, with a total of 13 fire officials among the top 25 highest-paid city employees in 2020, compared to just two law enforcement officials.
But their pay couldn’t compete with what the highest-paid city employee, then-City Manager Jimmy Morales, earned last year, according to a Miami Herald analysis of the city of Miami Beach’s 2020 payroll. Morales made $396,950 in 2020 before he left in early 2021 to join Miami-Dade County’s government following a 10-year tenure as city manager.
Morales’ pay in Miami Beach last year made him one of the top-paid public employees in all of Miami-Dade County. He made more as city manager than all but three county employees did last year, and would have been the top-paid city employee in both Hialeah and Miami.
This year, Morales’ replacement, Alina Hudak, agreed to a $372,000-a-year compensation package that includes a base salary of $320,000.
Not far behind Morales in 2020 was then-City Attorney Raul Aguila, who made $340,852 before retiring in September of this year. Aguila’s counterpart in Miami-Dade government, the since-retired Abigail Price-Williams, made $416,000 in 2020. Hialeah’s city attorney, Lorena Bravo, made about $205,000. Miami City Attorney Victoria Méndez was paid about $299,000.
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Search the database
For this story, the Miami Herald requested compensation information for the 2,349 people paid in 2020 by or through the city of Miami Beach. To determine total compensation for each employee, the Herald included base pay, overtime and “other” compensation like pay incentives and fringe benefits, but excluded off-duty pay, which is footed by the private sector.
To eliminate the small payouts that come with employees who only worked a few hours a week or who joined the city’s workforce late in the year, the Herald eliminated anyone earning less than $8,902. That’s the equivalent of working 20 hours a week at Florida’s minimum wage in 2020 of $8.56 an hour. Screening for compensation under that amount left payouts to 2,225 employees.
The Top 25 earners can be found in the chart attached to this article. To search the database for all 2,225 employees in the Herald database — or to browse by department — use the interactive tool below.
Public safety employees and elected officials
A Herald review of the data found further evidence that government jobs remain a pillar of Miami-Dade County’s middle class. The median pay for a Miami Beach city employee in 2020 was just shy of $73,000, paying well above the median household income for the county as a whole, which the Census Bureau estimated at $54,991 for 2019.
The data also shows that, in a tourist-driven city that expands and contracts with weekend and holiday crowds, overtime continued to play a big role in boosting public safety employees’ pay. By working long hours, and with the help of “other” compensation, some public safety employees were able to double their salary in 2020.
The third-, fourth- and fifth-highest paid city employees all worked for Miami Beach Fire Rescue: Lt. John Hirnyk made about $293,498, Assistant Chief Juan Mestas made $263,208 and Capt. Charlton Price made $261,687. Hirnyk and Price both made more than $50,000 in overtime work.
The top-paid police officers last year, Lt. Hyok Chong and Sgt. Jerome Berrian Jr., earned $250,034 and $243,490, respectively. Both earned more than $80,000 in overtime. Chong was the city’s 13th-highest paid employee, and Berrian its 19th.
Miami Beach, which has a seven-mile coastline, also employs 90 full-time and about 50 part-time lifeguards under the fire department’s Ocean Rescue branch. The highest paid member of the division was Ocean Rescue Division Chief Vincent Canosa Jr., who earned about $151,415 in 2020 — more than double the median pay of the department that year.
Meanwhile, the mayor and other members of the City Commission are among the lowest-paid employees at City Hall. Mayor Dan Gelber took home $37,230 in 2020 and the commissioners made between $23,249 and $40,299. Compensation is typically about $40,000 for the mayor and $39,000 for the commissioners, but during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic most elected officials took voluntary pay cuts. Commissioner Ricky Arriola donated about $17,000 of his 2020 compensation.
Miami Beach is a manager-run form of government, with the city manager and professional staff handling the day-to-day responsibilities of running the city while elected leaders are considered part-time employees. Full-time staff working in the Office of the Mayor and City Commission includes a chief of staff, mayoral and commission aides, a brand manager, a public information officer, two office associates and two secretaries. They all earn more than the city’s elected leaders, with Michele Burger, chief of staff to the mayor and commission, earning the most at $154,240 last year.
Miami Beach commissioners have tried twice since 2018 to raise their compensation via ballot referendum, but voters rejected both attempts, in 2018 and 2019. While their base salaries — $10,000 for the mayor and $6,000 for commissioners — have not changed since 1966, the city’s elected leaders receive monthly expense stipends and car allowances that count toward their pensions.
The 2019 referendum sought to increase the mayor’s salary to $75,636 and commissioner salaries to $45,381, not including the non-salary benefits.
This story was originally published December 16, 2021 at 6:00 AM.
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