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With battles raging over how much and in what form city workers will contribute to erasing Berkeley’s $10.3 million budget shortfall, the City Council will consider adoption of the city manager’s Budget Reduction Plan for fiscal years 2005 and 2006 at tonight’s (Tuesday, June 22) regular meeting. 

The city’s three largest unions—the Berkeley Police Association and Service Employees International Union Locals 535 and 790—have already agreed to giving back a percentage of workers’ salaries to the city for a one-year period. These three unions represent more than 60 percent of city employees. 

But unions representing city firefighters, managers, and electrical workers are balking at the deal. 

Deputy City Manager Lisa Caronna said the city is threatening to invoke a clause in the contracts of the Public Employees Union, Local 1 and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 1245 which allows the city to unilaterally implement the giveback plan. 

While the firefighters’ union is the only city union that does not have such a unilateral salary giveback clause, City Councilmember Dona Spring has proposed that the council cut $300,000 in firefighters overtime pay for next year to make up the difference. The last minute cut would come after the city and fire department worked throughout the spring to realize savings in the department without cutting fire services. 

City staff officials were emphatic that the city could make the cuts without union approval. 

“The union contracts give the council rights to make reductions,” City Attorney Manuela Albuquerque said. Deputy City Manager Caronna added that a clause in the contracts of Local One and IBEW Local 1245 states that the city can implement salary reductions as part of a “general curtailment program.” 

The unions, however, are disputing the legality of any unilateral move from the city and have threatened to file a grievance or lawsuit should the city take action, according to a notice for a closed meeting of the City Council scheduled for Tuesday afternoon. 

Representatives for local unions did not return phone calls for this story. Local One and IBEW, Local 1245 have both pushed for the city to allow them to take unpaid voluntary time off to achieve savings rather than the one-year salary reduction, Councilmember Kriss Worthington said. 

As an incentive for its unions to accept the giveback, the city has agreed not to invoke the fiscal emergency clause again for the remainder of their contracts. 

The fire fighters are in a better negotiating position than other unions. They have the only contract among city unions that lacks the clause allowing the city to unilaterally implement salary reductions in times of fiscal crisis. 

Aware of its strong negotiating leverage, the firefighters union last week alerted the city that it wouldn’t discuss a giveback unless the city “reached mutual signed agreements” with its other five unions. 

Throughout the negotiations, the council had threatened to take the unpopular move of closing non-essential services once a month to save money if any of the unions refused to agree to the giveback.  

However, Councilmember Spring said that with three unions on board, and the city confident it can legally compel Local One and IBEW Local 1245 to accept the same deal, City Manager Phil Kamlarz told her he would ask the council Tuesday to consider reducing the fire department budget by $300,000—the same amount the city stood to gain had the union accepted the giveback. 

“We have to pass a budget and we can’t pass it with a $300,000 deficit. Something has to give,” Spring said. 

This is not the first time the city and the firefighters union have butted heads. Last year union opposition helped kill a planned $7 million parcel tax for fire services that sought to free up money in the general fund to pay for city services in danger of being cut. After that, the union took out advertisements and distributed fliers urging residents to oppose any cuts in fire services. 

Meanwhile, the other pieces of the city budget appear to have fallen into place.  

Mayor Tom Bates has retooled his proposal to use $192,000 in one-time money to partially restore funding to numerous community nonprofits for six months.  

Responding to requests from councilmembers, his plan now includes more money for civic arts programs including the Center for Innovative Technology which offers arts classes for disabled residents.  

Should the council adopt his plan, as expected, the funding would be sustained if voters pass ballot measures in November to increase the tax on property transfers to pay for youth programs and increase the Utility Users Tax to add $2.7 million to the general fund.