After six months of negotiations, City Council voted 5-1 during its regular meeting Monday night to approve a half-percent pay raise for local firefighters.
Councilman Dion Bracco cast the lone dissenting vote on the motion to approve the memorandum of understanding between the City and the International Association of Firefighters Local 2805.
In addition to the half-percent salary increase effective July 1 through June 30, 2014, Gilroy Human Resources Director LeeAnn McPhillips said the City will continue cost sharing on medical and dental insurance; provide an additional 24 hours of personal leave time for fiscal year 2014; and provide up to $750 a year in tuition reimbursement for courses related to a firefighter’s job.
As part of the GFD’s physical fitness program, firefighters also receive up to $750 twice a year for high scores on physical fitness examinations.
“The purpose of the physical fitness incentive program is to provide a measurage, tangible and immediate reward for those individuals who have achieved and continually maintain themselves to fitness standards,” reads the department’s standard operating procedure.
The City and Local 2805 agreed to the incentive program in order to “reduce the number of work-related injuries and improve the overall health of all employees.”
“Staff worked closely with members of Local 2805 to prepare this document and complete the negotiation process,” McPhillips said, adding that the City and Local 2805 used “an informal interest-based approach” to reach the current agreement, eliminating legal costs that both sides typically incur during negotiations.
In June, City Council approved a memorandum of understanding for a two-year contract with AFSCME Local 101 and the Gilroy Management Association, representing police and management employees, as well as a salary increase. The two bargaining groups saw a 2 percent pay increase July 1 and they’ll see an additional 2 percent raise July 1, 2014.
The prolonged negotiations with the firefighters, Mayor Pro Tempore Perry Woodward noted, had a lot to do with the fact the other City bargaining units negotiated a two percent pay increase.
“I think that that’s a recognition that the firefighters are not getting as much as the other units,” he added. “Frankly, I think the firefighters were – and this is my personal view – more highly paid relative to their peers both within the City of Gilroy and compared to other cities. So there was a bit of a realignment that occurred with this negotiation.”
Prior to the completion of this negotiation, Woodward said the median Gilroy firefighter, factoring in overtime and everything else, was making more than the median Gilroy police officer.
“This fixes that,” he said. “If you look at comparable cities, Gilroy’s firefighters are very well compensated. So this starts to bring them in line with the market itself. In my time on the Council since 2007, we’ve been in a financial crisis.”
The starting base salary for a firefighter is $72,439 a year, according to the salary schedule that went into effect July 2013.
McPhillips, explaining the process of negotiations, said usually the chief negotiator or union president is the first to sign off on a new contract. Once Council approval is obtained, the rest of the bargaining members sign the document.
Woodward took issue with a provision in the MOU which mandates the City and Local 285 agree to share the cost of obtaining a report that finds out what it will cost to fund post-employment health benefits offered through CalPERS. According to the MOU, the “City shall contribute up to $2,750 toward the cost of the valuation report.”
“I’ll vote for it, but I think it’s a strange provision,” Woodward said, explaining that he didn’t want to hold up negotiations over that language.
“A lot of agencies, cities, counties and special districts pay their employees’ health benefits after they retire – and we don’t do that,” Woodward said. “That is one of the things that has gotten so many cities in a lot of trouble financially is trying to provide those really expensive benefits. It’s not something I think we should be providing because we can’t afford to provide it. If they want to explore that, it seems they should be paying for it themselves.”
McPhillips said the cost to implement the new contract for Local 2805 firefighters is roughly $60,000.
