In the wake of the Bell executive-salary scandal, state legislators will consider a bill today that would require cities, counties and school districts to post their employees’ salaries online.

The discussion of SB 501, which was co-authored by state Assemblyman Cameron Smyth, R-Santa Clarita, coincides with proposals from the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors’ discussions Tuesday of how to fix the troubled city.

“The Bell incident certainly disclosed how easy it can be at the local level for unethical behavior, and how easily it can be perpetuated,” Smyth said. “At the state level, there are numerous watchdog organizations and fewer legislators (to watch).”

The California Fair Political Practice Commission posts all financial disclosure forms for state lawmakers and county supervisors, including compensation, on its website.

The bill would apply the same standard to all local government employees.

The Bell scandal could have been avoided had employees from Bell posted their earnings online, said Bob Stern, president of the Los Angeles-based Center for Governmental Studies. Bell, which has about 45,000 residents, was susceptible to abuse because its city government lacked scrutiny from a local media outlet, he said. 

But while more transparency is good, Stern said disclosing every government employee’s salary may invade some people’s privacy.

“Hopefully, they won’t put a name next to a person’s salary. That may be a little intrusive,” Stern said. “The real question is, do you have to put down everyone’s salary? Even the people earning $10,000 or $20,000 a year? The concern is with excessive salaries, and that’s why I think a threshold should be set.”

The bill, introduced by state Sen. Lou Correa, D-Orange County, will focus mainly on high-ranking public officials, Smyth said.

Meanwhile, Los Angeles County Supervisors voted unanimously at a meeting Tuesday to lobby state legislators to repay Bell residents $2.9 million in property taxes that state Controller John Chiang determined was taken from them illegally.

At the same meeting, Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich, who represents the Santa Clarita Valley, requested a report to examine how much it would cost the county to provide fire, police and other services to Maywood and Bell if either sought to become unincorporated.

Facing bankruptcy, the city of Maywood fired most of its employees in June and agreed to turn its operations over to Bell, a neighboring city. But that was before Bell officials found themselves at the center of controversy.

In July, a regional newspaper discovered that Bell’s city manager was making almost $800,000, and members of its part-time city council were taking home about $100,000 a year.

Santa Clarita’s City Manager Ken Pulskamp, who runs a city with about 180,000 residents, makes $241,633 a year.