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Most of city’s workforce demands better wages

By Kurtis Alexander Daily Planet Staff
Tuesday June 18, 2002

Four unions representing more than 60 percent of the city’s workforce united Monday in unprecedented fashion to leverage frustrations about six months of contract negotiations without a resolution. 

In a written statement to city managers, union leaders are demanding that 1,000 union employees, as they rework contracts due to expire July 6, receive raises similar to those of police officers and city executives. 

The statement cites a 31 percent cost-of-living hike recently awarded to police, over their new contract period, and similar pay raises for the city’s executive management staff. 

“It costs us just as much to live,” said Herschel Hollie, who is a Public Works Department employee and a representative for Local One, one of the four unions issuing the joint statement. “But we’re being low-balled in the negotiations.” 

City Manager Weldon Rucker, who has just received the union statement and has not completely reviewed it yet, said the union’s posturing was a long-time coming. 

“Contracts have been in the works for a while. This just brings it to a head,” he said, adding that he was optimistic about the process. “We’re hoping to come up with a sufficient retirement package and significant cost of living adjustments, if our budget can provide.” 

Rucker, though, was quick to dismiss the union’s comparisons of public safety officials’ contracts with contracts of nonuniformed city employees’ contracts. A different job market, different professional responsibilities and state benefit laws didn’t make for useful analogies, he said. 

Rucker intends to call a meeting this week between the city’s labor negotiating team and union leaders to iron out the differences. 

Details of the unions’ demands were not specific in Monday’s statement, and union leaders could not be reached for comment. 

The union statement calls on city managers to “provide both fair and equitable compensation and a PERS retirement plan” and “preserve injured worker’s protection” for the city’s unionized civilian workforce. Specifics would likely vary with department and position. 

The four unions in collaboration include Local One, Local 790 of Service Employees International Union, Local 535 of SEIU and Local 1245 of International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. They are a range of professions, from mid-level managers to technical and trade positions. 

Though the unions have been talking with city managers since January, insiders say it is unlikely that the stalemate will be broken before the contracts expire next month.