The Lafayette City-Parish Council is set to finalize the LCG annual budget over the coming weeks. With many budget items set to be reviewed, few will garner as much controversy as reports of councilmen Kenneth Boudreaux and Brandon Shelvin seeking an individual pay increase.

City-Parish President Joey Durel joined “Mornings with Ken and Bernie” for his weekly “Lafayette Live” segment to discuss the budget as well as the legality of pay increases for individual council members.

In a recent interview with KATC, councilman Kenneth Boudreaux discussed his justification for a pay increase.

Actually, because I'm probably the hardest working councilman here. But we have a very healthy budget and there's a lot of demand to serve this very progressive city that we live in. When I first got elected I committed to using part of my salary to serve my constituents.

City-Parish President Durel noted that according to the Lafayette City-Parish Home-Rule Charter, elected officials can ask for a 10-percent pay increase at anytime during their term, but no single council member can be paid any more than any other council member. Any pay raise must be applied to the entire council.

The council is a body. It's not individuals. According to the charter, no individual councilman can get a pay raise that doesn't go to all the councilmen. That will be a kink in the discussion. - Joey Durel

Durel reasons that no individual council member should be paid more than the others to ensure no single district is given preference over any other district.

One reason the council is a body is because no one district is worth more than any other district. - Joey Durel

The latest budget meeting will be held at 1pm today and is open to the public.

To hear the full audio from the interview, click the play button below:

More From News Talk 96.5 KPEL