L.A. City Council By The Numbers

Los Angeles City Council members are the highest paid and have the largest discretionary budgets of the 15 largest U.S. cities, according to a new study by The Pew Charitable Trusts Philadelphia Research Initiative.The average annual salary of L.A.'s elected council members is $178,789. That's about $48,000 more than the next highest paid city council in Washington D.C. San Antonio only pays its members about $1,400 annually.

Los Angeles City Council also led all 15 districts in spending on itself — $1.7 million per council seat. The study calculated the number by adding up the cost of council salaries, employee benefits and general operations — $25,350,580 for fiscal year 2011 — and divided that by the number of seats — 15.

L.A. has the lowest percentage of women serving on the council — 13 percent — but the second highest percentage of Hispanics — 33 percent.

Check out these and other interesting stats about the city councils in this interactive graphic designed by Pew's Philadelphia Research Initiative. See the full report here.

Graphic Credit: Pew Charitable Trusts Philadelphia Research Initiative

The photo of L.A. City Hall is by Flickr user hall.chris25. It was used under a Creative Commons License.