Can you guess which Hudson County town pays its top cop the most?

Is it Jersey City, which FBI statistics show has the highest violent crime rate by far, at 7.3 violent crimes per 1,000 residents in 2012? Nope. That city's chief, Philip Zacche, ranks No. 5 on the list with his $194,069 salary even though he oversees the largest police force in the county, at about 840 officers.

Is it West New York, which has the next highest violent crime rate, 3.8 violent crimes per 1,000 residents? No again. The town has no chief, and Robert Antolos, its police director, makes $70,000, putting him next to last on the list.

No, the chief with the highest pay is Bayonne, the county's southernmost municipality and a city with a population of 65,028. Its new chief, Drew Niekrasz, makes $238,394 a year overseeing Bayonne's roughly 155-officer force.

That's a full $33,394 more than the salary of the county's second highest-paid chief, Union City's Richard Molinari, who makes $205,000. And it's $63,394 more than Gov. Chris Christie is paid.

Niekrasz, who joined the force in 1988, isn't the only guy running Bayonne's police force, either. Robert Kubert, the public safety director, makes $70,000 (Kubert also helps to run the fire department and EMS).

And this for a city with the county's fifth lowest crime rate, 2.1 per 1,000 residents.

Across the Hudson River, New York City Police Commissioner Bill Bratton, who oversees over 34,000 police officers, has a base salary of $205,180.

Niekrasz became chief in July, succeeding Ralph Scianni, who made $234,000 a year when he retired.

Bayonne Mayor James Davis, a cop himself, said he didn't know his city was home to the county's highest paid police chief. Davis said even though the chief isn't part of a contract, contractual obligations to the city's two police unions help to keep the chief's salary high.

The city's contract with its police superiors guarantees a 15 percent pay differential between ranks. Davis said he hopes to negotiate a better deal for taxpayers for the next contract, and he wants to have a contract for the chief and his deputy so pay details are "all spelled out," he said.

"At some point, it's getting to be too much to hand people percentage raises," Davis said.

Of course, Davis may not be mayor when this contract expires - in December 2018, seven months after the next Bayonne mayor's race.

The 14 police chiefs and police directors in Hudson County (only Bayonne and Jersey City have men in both positions) make an average salary of $147,186. That includes the county's top cop, Sheriff Frank X. Schillari.

Three of the men - there are no women in either position throughout the county - make more than $200,000 and five make less than $100,000. Of those five, one, Weehawken Police Director Jeff Welz, has a second public job, co-director of North Hudson Regional Fire & Rescue, that gives him an additional $84,462.

The county's median household income is $58,722.

There is no correlation between the size of a police force and the pay of its chief. Zacche, who runs the Jersey City police department along with Public Safety Director James Shea, who makes $185,000, heads a department 13 times the size of Secaucus' force and yet makes a smidgen less than its last chief, Dennis Corcoran.

Weehawken Mayor Richard Turner said chiefs in smaller towns don't necessarily have fewer duties.

"The bigger the structure, the more backup there is," Turner said. "You may have one chief and five deputies. In a small town, you may have one chief and no deputies."

He added: "It all kind of washes out."

Census figures show salaries for New Jersey public employees are some of the highest in the nation, especially for police personnel. Police officers here in the Garden State earn about 40 percent higher than they do in the rest of the nation, figures show.

Full list of Hudson County police chief/director salaries

Bayonne Chief Drew Niekrasz: $238,394

Union City Chief Richard Molinari: $205,000

North Bergen Chief Robert Dowd: $203,168

Secaucus Chief Dennis Corcoran (retired): $194,137

Jersey City Chief Philip Zacche: $194,069

Kearny Chief John P. Dowie: $190,446

Jersey City Public Safety Director James Shea: $185,000

Hoboken Chief Kenneth Ferrante: $162,000

Harrison Chief Derek Kearns: $161,817

Hudson County Sheriff Frank Schillari: $117,938

East Newark Chief Anthony Monteiro: $94,527.26

Weehawken Police Director Jeff Welz: $84,966

Bayonne Police Director Robert Kubert: $70,000

West New York Police Director Robert Antolos: $70,000

Guttenberg Police Director Michael Caliguiro: $36,334 (also the town's administrator for an additional $36,334)

Salaries include longevity pay where applicable

Terrence T. McDonald may be reached at tmcdonald@jjournal.com. Follow him on Twitter @terrencemcd. Find The Jersey Journal on Facebook.