After overseeing layoffs and millions of dollars in salary cuts,
city council members are reluctant to announce their closed session
votes last week to give the city administrator and city clerk
nearly $15,000 in raises, sources said.
After overseeing layoffs and millions of dollars in salary cuts, city council members are reluctant to announce their closed session votes last week to give the city administrator and city clerk nearly $15,000 in raises, sources said.
Approving pay hikes for top brass may seem like political suicide given the bitterness at City Hall surrounding layoffs, frozen wages and budget cuts. However, the 5-percent merit raises City Administrator Tom Haglund and City Clerk Shawna Freels are each expected to receive as soon as the council votes in public mirror the $26,000 in merit raises the council approved for 29 rank-and-file workers between March and June, according to city figures.
In a closed session meeting last week, the council voted 6-1, with Councilman Gartman voting no, to approve a nearly $10,000 raise for Haglund, who earns $199,000, and 4-3 to approve a $4,700 raise for Freels, who earns $94,906, according to city figures and council members who spoke on condition of anonymity because Mayor Al Pinheiro must still meet and confer with Haglund and Freels before a public vote.
The council, which has approved more than $11 million in general fund cuts over the last year, including 48 full-time layoffs in January, froze annual merit raises for everyone in March. A few months later, the body approved contracts with the city’s five bargaining units – which do not include Haglund or Freels because they are Gilroy’s only two council-appointed employees – to save $3.1 million through furloughs and raise postponements, bringing this year’s deficit down to $1.6 million with $37 million budgeted for expenditures. While those agreements restored merit raises for those represented employees set to receive them between March and June, they froze all raises for every employee, except Freels and Haglund, from July 1 through June 2010.
Merit raises are in addition to regular cost of living adjustments, or COLAs, that most employees receive based on union-negotiated contracts. Merit raises are also known as a “step increase” because the discretionary pay bump raises an employee’s salary by one “step” out of five assigned to that position’s pay grade, which comes out to 5 percent per step. Once an employee reaches their pay ceiling, they can no longer receive merit raises but can still receive COLAs.
Union officials, who have generally decried the council for balancing the budget on the backs of workers rather than using reserves or selling city land, either declined to comment about Haglund and Freel’s likely raises, because the council has yet to announce them, or they agreed with them.
“I would not fault the council for giving (Haglund and Freels) exactly what they agreed to give to every other bargaining unit,” Fire Local 2805 Spokesperson Jim Buessing said. “They deserve what was due to them.”
Buessing and Gilroy Police Officers Association President Mitch Madruga both said they had not heard of the council’s closed-door decision.
“I’m going to have to reserve my opinion until I get better educated on this,” said Madruga, whose 56-member union unanimously approved a “no confidence” vote in the mayor last month based primarily on his alleged mistreatment and misunderstanding of public safety workers.
There also seems to be misunderstanding around whether the council should have reported the votes. Instead, the mayor announced afterward that the council gave him direction to meet with Haglund and Freels to review their evaluations. Any final action on those evaluations will be voted on in public, but that will come after votes such as last Monday’s that lead up to the final, public vote.
“Any final action on raises must be in open session. They can’t vote to approve it in closed session,” said Terry Francke, general counsel for Californians Aware. That still leaves the council room to hold mini-votes beforehand that lead up to their final vote, a tricky legal issue that cities tend to interpet narrowly, Francke said.
“This issue has never really been settled by by an attorney general or a court opinion,” Francke said. “If there is a vote taken, then that needs to be reported because the disclosure of votes is necessary to evaluate the jobs that these members are doing.”
Last Monday’s “vote” was a lead-up to that public forum that will include a chance for public comment before a formal vote on the raises, Pinheiro said.
“It would be premature to announce anything if I haven’t even met with the people that we met in closed session about,” Mayor Al Pinheiro wrote in an e-mail from the Azores off Portugal where he is building a second home and vacationing.
Gilroy’s own open government ordinance permits closed sessions for personnel evaluations and contract bargaining, but after every closed session, the council votes whether to disclose any portions. State and local laws permit personnel discussions and require the disclosure of any action taken, but last week’s votes were merely directions to Pinheiro to bargain further with Haglund and Freels, according to council members.
Councilman Craig Gartman agreed with Pinheiro but declined to elaborate.
“Yes, there was a vote taken, but I cannot tell you how I voted,” said Gartman, the only council member who voted to take disciplinary action against Haglund earlier this year for signing off on merit pay hikes in the midst of layoffs and declining city revenues.
