As I was saying in a previous blog, I recently been struggling through the city firefighters’ contracts, and I don’t mind saying, it’s all Greek to me. “Legalese,” I think it’s called. The worst thing is, they treat you like a moranus because you don’t understand the gobble-ty-gook they spin up just to make sure you don’t understand.
Here’s how they explain the pay rate in the current IAFF (International Association of Fire Fighters, the union) contract:
Regular Hourly Rate
1.2.5. Regular Hourly Rate. Regular Hourly Rate shall mean an hourly rate calculated by summing all non-overtime and non-out of class pay for the bi-weekly pay period, with the specific exception of Holiday Pay as defined in Section 2, Subsection 5.3.1, and dividing the total by 112 for Employees assigned to a fifty-six (56) hour work week, and by 80 for those employees assigned to a forty (40) hour work week.
As my friend Stephanie Taber said recently about the firefighters’ contract, “confused???? so am I!” Stephanie is way more patient than I am, when she doesn’t understand these documents, she e-mails the appropriate department and asks the questions, then sticks around long enough to get an answer.
In the letter I wrote to the editor, I asked about the 56 hour week – did that mean 16 hours of guaranteed overtime? Is that how some of these employees almost DOUBLE their salaries? One person I saw on the salary charts had added $80,000 in OT to his $90,000 salary – and he’s not the only one who does that. As I pointed out in my letter, the fire department alone bills for over a million dollars a year in overtime. I wonder, how do they do that?
When Stephanie asked the human resources department about overtime, here was the response: “Under the terms of the IAFF MOU City firefighters get paid overtime for any hours they work in excess of 56 in a seven day period.”
Okay, now I’m confused. You can schedule people for 56 hours without paying them overtime? News to me. And, I still don’t understand, how do they rack up the overtime pay when they have to work over 56 hours a week to get it? I mean, there’s not a house burning down or an accident every freaking minute. In fact, hours and hours go by, every day, when nothing justifying the use of gasoline even happens around here.
I got a new question. Are we paying people to sleep? To watch tv? To take the hook and ladder to the grocery store?
Human Resources offered more explanation: “In addition, under the terms of the Fair Labor Standards Act, they get paid overtime for any hours they work in excess of 182 in a 24 day period. For the City of Chico this equates to an additional 5 hours of pay for each person every 24 day period.”
I keep seeing that word, “work”, and I keep wondering, “what do they mean by ‘work‘?”
So I will keep asking my questions.
Tags: CalPERS, Chico Firefighters Legislative Action Group, City of Chico, City of Chico fire department, IAFF, International Association of Firefighters, Ken Campbell Chico Ca, pensions, unfunded pension liabilities
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