The Unusual, the Not Good, the Phone Calls

So, what to make of the announcement this week that a handful of Police Department managers were getting demoted and taking a pay cut?

It’s unusual, it’s not good, and if I were a manager in another city department, I wouldn’t be taking too many calls from 345-9550.

First, the unusual. I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of this before. It’s creative, I’ll say that. It’s obviously an effort to keep cops on the street, which everyone agrees is the top priority. It’s probably worth mentioning that the “demotions” aren’t based on job performance (obviously), but instead are a mechanism for lowering pay. I don’t know if maybe they’ll all get “promotions” in the future, but I do feel bad for the “demoted” and their families. A pay cut is never a happy affair. It would be good if they were given some preference on details (yes, more work, but more opportunity) to make up some of the difference. (Note: This is not an endorsement of details as presently constituted. But if we’re playing by the rulebook, use the rules to their advantage.)

Now, the not good. Obviously, this is in reaction to current and upcoming local aid cuts, and there’s more to come. These guys are the first victims, but there’s certainly more to come. I’m not sure if this is the final solution to keeping cops on the street, or if there’s more to come. There’s no way of knowing right now, but this is a sure sign that things are going to more difficult in the next five months. Layoffs were avoided, and hopefully that remains the case. It’s easy to hammer the classic city employee/donut-eating cop stereotype, but this is no time to be wishing someone out of a job. Put this way: If you lost your job tomorrow, how many options would you have for a new one? More and more, people are realizing the answer is “very few,” or “none.” While this is predominately about numbers and services, there’s also human decency involved, and I wouldn’t want to be the one handing out pink slips. That’s gotta play a role now, and later. But this doesn’t soothe any jagged nerves in City Hall and other departments.

Finally, that phone call. There’s a very interesting thought process that seems obvious here. The goal is to keep police officers on the street. How do we that? One way might be get higher-paid members to take a pay cut, and use that savings to keep offices out there. This wasn’t a random numbers cut. It had a direct purpose. You’d have to think that the Mayor’s Office might have similar ideas – or other department-specific ideas – up their sleeve. Are other department managers going to play the same ball? Will they have a choice? Chances are, the phone is going to be ringing soon, and their not going to have any choice but to answer it. I guess we’ll see.

Additionally, what’s up with the Police Department. I’ll admit it. A year, nine months ago, I was really turned off by the union’s moves on raises. Since then, they’ve led the way on contract negotiations by agreeing to no retroactive pay and taking a fairly modest annual percentage increase. (Note: I know people are hung up on those settlements, but please, please, please, don’t forget the general dismissal of retroactive pay. That is such a huge savings, and can’t be overlooked. I’d think we’d be doubling the numbers, if not more, if retro were included. It might not have been the best time to settle, but if you get nowhere, the unions dig in, and a year from now you’re paying the same raises PLUS another year of retro? Yikes.) Now, some of the highest-ranking members of the department are taking bumps down. Looking back, I still can’t get happy about the public tactics, but the contract and this move has me impressed with what they’ve done. Knowing the guys who took this cut, they’ve got a lot invested in the department and the community. It would be unfortunate if they left. Wouldn’t blame them, but it would be unfortunate. I guess we’ll have to see.

So, it begins. $250,000 or so down, $2,750,000 to go (probably actually more, but don’t let big math get in the way of a literary device, I always say).

Contracting Incentives

The council spent some time Tuesday night picking away at the police contract, and there was some grousing about the incentives and perks in the deal. Which are the same as the old perks and incentives.

Look, some of these perks are silly and need to get gone one of these day. I'm thinking the "no accident" clause is one. Some concerns are completely valid, and need to be addressed. I'm thinking about Dave Clark's long-standing effort to get new employees to pay a larger portion of health insurance costs.

Here's the thing, though. There wasn't a lot of wiggle room here. In some way, this is an emergency settlement.

Wong needs to get the unions to the table on the health insurance. Has to happen at some point. But isn't settling contracts that are two years expired top priority? Considering there's a whole different process on that, it could take some time.

More pressing are incentives. But really, how far could Wong go? And how far could the union go? The union set aside retroactive raises. The 4 and 2 percent bumps in January and July only go so far in curing that. The union left thousands of dollars per member on the table. You gotta give a little to get a little. The union left money on the table, it kept its perks.

Hopefully we can include "for now." It's easy to make political hay on incentives and perks. But getting them negotiated out is a whole different ballgame. You have to give a little to get a little (yeah, I'm repetitive), so what does the city have to give to get the incentives eliminated? Or does the city go nuclear, try to rip out the incentives, and offer nothing in return? That would be, um, interesting.

The bottom line at this point is that for better or worse you can't fiddle with the perks without giving something back. And considering how horrible this situation was/in, rolling them over at this point may have been the only way to get any kind of contract done.

Police Get a Deal

The head of the police union says his members aren't happy with the deal. Annie DiMartino says she won't vote for a 6 percent increase. Sometimes, the sign of a good compromise is everyone hates it.

If you missed it, the police union and the mayor have agreed to a contract that gives the union a 4 percent raise on Jan. 1, and a 2 percent raise on July 1. (Note: those percentages are flipped from what you might have read in today's papers. Wong says the above numbers are accurate). There is no retroactive raises for '07 and '08.

The police union doesn't have to like this deal, but its members should be praised for accepting it. Big time. I'm amazed they pushed aside retro pay. The 4 percent is a pretty good number (a very good number), but leaving the retro pay behind is a huge move for them. Can't be understated. If you want a symbol for doing the right thing, the police union throws out a big one today.

From my simple calculations, according to the budget the patrolmen are being paid $3 million this year. The overall increase from both raises is about $180,000. (That hasn't been confirmed, and is merely a ballpark figure. Don't take it to the bank.)

But one of the big factors lurking behind all of this is the back pay that would have come with retroactive raises. If DiMartino is opposed to the 6 percent in total increase, how would she have felt if there were retro raises? Let's say the patrolmen salaries were $3 million in 2006. (Sure, that might not be accurate, but without raises, and layoff since then, the number is probably higher. Just bear with me.). Four 2 percent raises (in 07, 08, 09, 10) would cost the city a total of $247,000, or $67,000 more than the deal as structured. A good chunk of that would have been back pay ($121,000 according to two years of 2 percent increases starting at $3M). So, the city got the union to move away from retro pay. A huge move.

So, good for the union for agreeing to it, and good for the mayor for getting them to agree to it. I don't get the feeling they'll be holding hands together anytime soon, but it's a step forward for the city.

Now, what will the council do? If DiMartino is the voice of the majority, do they shoot this down? That might be the question of the day.

Union, mayor back at it

If you didn't see Saturday's Sentinel, the police union wrote Mayor Lisa Wong a letter claiming she is out of touch and not properly funding the department. Wong said the out-of-touch claim is ridiculous.

Not good times for the mayor. The library folks are already displeased, and the union returns with more fire. And the police department got a little more money through the budget process.

So that's two departments that are looking for money, and are blaming Wong for the financial issues in their departments. There's probably a line where "no money" crosses into "out of touch." Has that line been crossed?

It appears pretty certain the police union is not buddies with Wong, and likely won't ever be. More bad news for Wong, especially in that they don't seem to feel the need to be shy about it. You'd have to think they'll be searching for a candidate to back next fall. You also have to wonder if other departments and unions are going to join the fun.

While we're here, it's worth noting that city councilors told the Sentinel they hadn't seen the letter. But the Sentinel had seen it, and I'm guessing it didn't come from the Mayor's Office. So you'd have to think the union is going to grind its ax in full public view the rest of the way.

But the bad news is now starting to back up on her. Her options are being reduced for next year. She can make run at overrides, or not. If she doesn't make a run at overrides, the library, police and others won't be getting more money and will likely get cut. If she does go for overrides, she'd going to tick off a whole lot of residents who don't want anything to do with an override. The likely outcome would be worst-case: She throws out override questions, everyone gets angry and shoots them down, and the departments still don't get any money, so everyone's angry.

So, what's she going to do? The original override plan went in the dumper with the deadline foul-up of earlier this summer. But at some point -- sooner rather than later -- she's going to have to decide one way or another which way to go on this. Either commit to an override effort or not. And by that I mean either move that way or don't. She can't wait until the holidays to roll out an override effort for February or March for next year's budget. It's gotta happen soon to get people prepared and understand what's going on. She talked about leadership a lot during the campaign, and now might be the time to show it.

'We Had Moved On'

So says police union chief Ron L'Ecuyer in today's Telegram on the heels of yesterday's hub-bub regarding the police no-show at Sunday's swearing-in for Chief Robert DeMoura.

It wasn't a good day for the police union yesterday (and it continues on the Sentinel's editorial page today). They were generally roasted here, and at the S&E forum under their story yesterday. I'd guess comments were running about 75-25 against the no-show, and it wasn't always pretty.

L'Ecuyer says it wasn't intentional. I'll leave that to the eye of the beholder. But I will say that yesterday, as I had a few times in the last few months, I asked for someone, anyone, involved in the union to say something about moving on. Finally, yesterday, after about three months of chaos, it finally happened. That is good news.

L'Ecuyer and DeMoura said all the right things yesterday, and apparently met for about 45 minutes. Hopefully this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship. That said, both L'Ecuyer and DeMoura are talking raises, which seems like maybe a high-stakes game when the mayor is talking a $1 million cut in that department. If DeMoura can make it happen, you'd have to think he'd win that department over pretty fast.

When Does It End?

I know, I know, I owe a post on the new chief business. I'll get to it eventually. It's a little more cumbersome than I first thought.

Anyway, while we're here, a few thoughts (OK, a lot of lengthy thoughts) on yesterday's disappointing disappearing act by the PD at Police Chief Robert DeMoura's swearing-in.

When does this end? When my 4-year-old (5 tomorrow, but you get the point) pouts "It's not fair," we generally laugh or ignore her. But this isn't funny, and it can't be ignored any more. And yes, I'm purposefully comparing the police union to a bunch of 4- and 5-year-olds.

If you didn't hear -- the rumor mill was blazing about this late last week, so it wasn't a big shocker -- police officers took a pass on yesterday's swearing-in. Just the latest in the union's pity party over DeMoura being chosen. At some point, one of two things are going to happen. The union is going to get over it and move on. Or it won't, and the people they work for are going to suffer for it, if they aren't already.

The union has a number of gripes with the city, some valid, some not. In most cases, the gripes focus on how horrible Lisa Wong is, which is mostly not valid. If you need a refresher, skim through the many, many comments on the Police Department from Receivership and others. That should get you up to date. Let's review:

The department needs new cruisers. This is a valid need. The cruiser money has been cut in the last two budgets, and you'd have to think it's not coming this time around. Sadly, the city is in financial straights. It has nothing to do with being anti-police or anti-police union. Can Wong and DeMoura find money for cars in this upcoming budget (with the $5 million hole in it)? I think the union and the officers understand the situation. This is becoming more and more of a priority, but I'm not sure it's going to be taken care of this year, sadly.

The officers desevere a raise. Heck, who doesn't? And yes, the union raise situation is a very messy one. And yes, it's a valid demand in a vacuum, but not in the current economic environment. But you know what, it's not really Wong or DeMoura's fault. And by "not really," I should say, "not their fault at all." It's one of the many messes they inherit. But the union also has to realize that they got hooked up a little bit last year when the dispatchers were let go. Also, the current financial situation creates this potential quandry: Raises, but layoffs. Or, more likely, raises, but even more layoffs. My perception has always been that unions in general prefer raises, even in the face of layoffs. I don't know if that's the case here. But considering the current financial situation, the cries for a raise probably won't go too far with the public. Especially a public that seems to be fighting its own economic hardships. But maybe that's just me. The police union got hosed on raises. But you can't remake the past. You can only deal with the present, and it's not a present that seems very bright-looking on this point. The union is right to complain on this one, but there may not be very much it can do on it, either.

DeMoura is the chief. Completely not valid. Take off "Fitchburg" in Paul Bozicas' resume and "Lowell" in DeMoura's, and replace them with "Smallville" and "Tinytown." Most people would agree that DeMoura was the better candidate. I hate to crank on Bozicas even a little bit, because he's a good guy and would be a good chief, but I'm still waiting for someone from to argue that Bozicas was the better candidate, not just that he's the local guy.

I'm also still waiting for someone to say "We're moving on." Hell, I'd take, "We're disappointed, but we're moving on." At this point, "We're bitterly disappointed and think Wong and DeMoura are Mrs. And Mr. Evil, but we're moving on," would be OK. Yesterday most certainly wasn't that day, apparently. Instead of taking the high road, the union continues to drag this out. I'd love to be a fly on the wall in the PD today, although it will probably be about as uncomfortable as Michael Scott's condo (if you saw last week's "The Office," you know exactly what I'm talking about). Despite the no-show, DeMoura is still showing up for work today.

Here's, now, the question. Up to yesterday, it was OK to write the union's stance off as sour grapes, and maybe the need for a little time to get over and move on. But, clearly, they are not moving on, and probably don't plan on moving on anytime soon.

Which is OK, I guess, but the professional and responsible move would have been to show up. The union, like Wong and DeMoura, work for the taxpayers of the city. We elected Wong, who in doing what she thought was right for the city, picked DeMoura. The union has acted throughout as if the chief works for it, not the city. Now, the union has made its professionalism and responsibility while on the job open to question. After this latest move, how can you automatically assume officers are going to work today with an open mind and a focus on working for citizens, when they clearly have self-created a distraction that they aren't getting over? This is a situation it created over the last few months.

DeMoura has a mandate to make the city safer, but does he have the tools and manpower dedicated to that mandate, or a union that only wants to make him miserable and set him up for failure? It's more than a political question, it's one that gets to the very heart of the safety of the 40,000 people that live in this city. It's sad and unfortunate that the union has forced it to be asked.