I received the agenda for the next city council meeting yesterday, and there at the bottom is a discussion of the cops latest contract proposal. Here’s the report summary – I’ll admit, I edited in the slashes in that first date, they’d been left out and it looked like nonsense:
Chico POA
Proposal – September 24, 2014
The following is a proposal for a successor MOU to the one expiring 12/31114 between the
Chico Police Officers’ Association and the City of Chico. This proposal is intended to begin the
bargaining process and introduce several ideas that the POA believes can create a better
environment within the City of Chico Police Department, specifically the Departments ability to
retain and recruit police officers.
When possible, the current MOU provision that would be affected is listed. Wording is NOT
final and will be edited to reflect any changes prior to submission to the City in formal
bargaining.
1. Three year term ofMOU: 11/11/15-12/31/17. 1.3A
2. Salary. 5% increase effective 1/1/15, 1/1116 and 1/1/17. 5.1 and Exhibit B
3. Longevity. Add four new longevity step increases of 4% at the following length of time
of employment with the city: 10 years, 15 years, 20 years and 25 years. New Article
5.12 “Longevity Pay”
4. Pay Step Addition and Adjustment. 5.1C
a. Add a Step H at 5% salary increase.
b. Add a “training pay” step equivalent to $18 per hour.
5. Cash out Holiday Time Banlc Reinstate policy of allowing employees to cash out
unused holiday time bank hours each year. 6.2
6. Vacation Cash Out. Allow employees to accrue vacation above the maximum caps and
to cash out any unused vacation accrued above the caps at the end of each calendar
year. 6.5
7. Holiday Hours. City shall provide ten hours of Holiday Time Bank pay for holidays.
6.1A
8. OT Pay for Holidays. City shall pay employees overtime rate for working holidays. 5.2
and 6.1
9. FICA and Dental to be paid by City. 6.3
I had to ask Debbie Presson to reload the reports yesterday, because she’d “accidentally” loaded them so that they could not be cut and paste. She complained that it would “take hours” to reload the reports properly, but she did it. I think they are required by law to do that, even though she tried to avoid doing it for years, telling me, she was afraid I’d edit them if they were available in cut and paste. I swear to God, she told me that. All the sudden Chris Constantin showed up and now she has to load them the way I ask. Every now and then I catch her loading them wrong and all I have to do is ask – she reloads them. She claims it’s a matter of a little button being switched. If a private sector worker made that mistake constantly I think they’d be out of a job, but Debbie not only stays hired, she gets over $135,000 a year in salary and only pays 9 percent of her loaded benefits package. I know it seems petty – but just think, what does “hours” of her time cost, to load reports into a computer?
Of course when I cc’d Chris Constantin, he sent me the whole MOU, in cut-and-pastable format. The summary only highlighted stuff the cops want to change – they want a 5 percent raise (bust a snicker!), they want their holiday and sick leave banks restored, they want, they want, they want. They remind me of the bums on the street corners, hand out, mouth open, ass slackened.
Michael Jones provides a good commentary on the summary here,
http://chicopolitics.com/2014/10/16/police-staffing/
but doesn’t discuss what I found in the whole MOU – the city will still collect union dues, including those officers who don’t want to join the union (they call that a “service fee”), and then handing the money over to the same union that dumps money into every election. And, Jones reports, the CPOA has missed the filing deadline for their campaign report. It was due October 6, but still is not posted. Jones dug into the muni code and found this to be a misdemeanor. Wow, let’s call the cops! Jones was the one who busted the news that such an agreement, according to administrative law judge and ex-city council candidate Joe Montes, is a blatant conflict of interest.
Here’s our dilemma: these contracts will not come up for discussion on council until AFTER THE ELECTION. And, I will remind Jones, they spend and collect late, so they don’t post their biggest report until AFTER THE ELECTION. I hope he’s not too disappointed when his candidates, Mark Sorensen, Reanette Fillmer and Andrew Coolidge, are shown to be the biggest recipients of the cops’ attentions, and then all turn around and sign this contract with very little editing. They will also be first on board for the sales tax increase, that’s my next prediction.
NOTE – I didn’t catch all the weird typos in the summary, but it’s readable
Chico Taxpayers Association 