The top public sector salary paid in Ottawa belongs to Dr. Jack Kitts, the president and CEO of the Ottawa Hospital, according to Ontario's annual 'sunshine list' of the province's top earners.

Kitts earned a salary of $642,000 in 2010. That's down $21,000 from the year before. He also gets $60,000 in taxable benefits on top of his salary.

By comparison, his salary is double what the prime minister makes. However, the chair of the Ottawa Hospital's board told CTV Ottawa the money is justified.

Here's what other top officials in Ottawa earned in 2010:

  • Dr. Bob Roberts, Ottawa Heart Institute, President $612,000
  • Michele Bilodeau, CHEO, CEO $373,000
  • Tom Schonberg, Queensway Carleton Hospital, President $313,000
  • Alan Rock, University of Ottawa, President $395,000
  • Bob Gillett, Algonquin College, President $364,000
  • Roseann Runte, Carleton University, President $320,000

Ontario is required by law to publish the salaries of public sector employees who make more than $100,000.

Not included in the so-called ‘sunshine list' are the $100,000-plus salaries at Hydro Ottawa.

However, in a financial submission to Ottawa city council last year, CEO Rosemarie Leclaire's salary was listed as $407,000, including a pay performance.

Leclaire has since left Hydro Ottawa for a position at the Ontario Energy Board.

In contrast, the top bureaucrat at the City of Ottawa, City Manager Kent Kirkpatrick, earned just over $280,000 last year.

More than 71,000 civil servants across the province are on the sunshine list, up 7,400 workers from last year. However, Ontario's finance ministry says the average salary on the list is actually down one per cent.

Tom Mitchell, the head of Ontario Power Generation, tops the list earning more than $1.3 million in 2010. Hydro One CEO Laura Formusa made nearly $1 million.

Canada's new governor general was the second-highest paid public sector worker last year, earning more than $1 million as president and vice-chancellor at the University of Waterloo.

According to the salary disclosure, David Johnston was paid $1,056,813 in salary and bonus in 2010. As governor general, he will be paid $129,800.

Premier Dalton McGuinty has rejected the idea of raising the minimum salary for the sunshine list to above $100,000.

"We're not changing the threshold because the threshold has already been set, and we're not going to tinker with that," he said on Thursday.

About 1.2 million people work in Ontario's public sector.

With a report from CTV Ottawa's John Crupi and Catherine Lathem and files from The Canadian Press