Published: November 03, 2009 12:44 am      

CITY OF LOCKPORT: Council cold to proposed fire pact

The firefighters union announced Monday that its members have proposed five-year labor contract with the city.

The Common Council has not agreed to the deal, however, and according to Council President John Lombardi III, isn’t likely to.

“We will not approve that (contract), not at this point. We have several concerns that need to be addressed,” Lombardi said.

“What’s on the table is a good start, but there are some things we absolutely do not want to be locked into,” Mayor Michael Tucker added.

The proposal, hammered out Oct. 21 with help from a professional mediator, would have the union agree to turn over bargained-for communications work to a third party.

It also would put into writing permanently, for the first time, a fixed minimum shift manning number: 10, the number ordered recently by an arbitrator called in to settle a long-running union-city dispute about staffing.

Last month, Fire Chief Thomas Passuite estimated the cost of complying with the 10-man rule to be an extra $300,000 to $500,000 a year, depending on whether the city wanted to employ more men on overtime or hire additional firefighters.

Lockport Professional Firefighters Association President Randall Parker said the union would cover the cost of 10-man shifts by cutting back the number of men who are allowed to be off-duty per shift.

Currently, firefighting staff are assigned to one of four platoons of 12 or 11 men that take turns covering shifts and, by existing contractual agreement, up to four men are allowed to be off-duty per shift.

Meanwhile, minimum manning has been between eight and 10 men per shift, the number set by the city fire board. When the number is higher and there are not enough men per platoon to cover it, more automatic overtime call-ins are required.

LPFA would agree to cut the off-duty number to three in exchange for guaranteed minimum shift manning of 10. Such a configuration would satisfy the union’s concerns about firefighter safety “at no additional cost to the city,” Parker said.

That’s not really true, Tucker said. His issues with the proposal are:

n Given existing firefighter strength, 47 men, 10 on duty/three off is no different from the status quo, nine on duty/four off duty. The fire overtime tab for this year will exceed $300,000; and about $100,000 of it is generated by the minimum manning requirement.

n Writing the number “10” into the contract would make it virtually irreversible in the future. The existing contract does not specify a number, referring instead to the city’s duty to “man all equipment with adequate manpower to assure” firefighters’ safety during performance of duties. Were the number to be written in, it could only be cut in the future if the union agreed, even if the city ordered reductions in fire department services.

“We don’t know what the future holds,” Tucker said. “What if, in the next 10 years, population drops by 5,000? We’d still be stuck (with the 10-men-per-shift rule) — and the fact is, we don’t need 52 firefighters today.”

n If LPFA is agreeable to centralized dispatch, it shouldn’t need 10 men per shift. Currently one firefighter on every shift is dedicated to working dispatch; he takes all incoming calls and does not leave the building to work on an ambulance or fight fires, thus nine firefighters per shift are emergency responders. If a third party handled fire dispatch duties, minimum fire shift manning should be nine, Tucker said.

Parker said the number 10 simply cements the arbitrator’s Oct. 7 order — which the city is preparing to challenge in state court. The arbitrator overstepped his bounds by dictating fire department policy, Tucker said.

In mediation, the city and LPFA each sent representatives to bargain through a certified mediator that both sides agreed to use. The mediator met with the sides together then apart, and jockeying between the two until he had a proposal that both the union and city negotiators would agree to take to their membership and the Council, respectively.

In addition to the dispatch and minimum manning planks, the proposal would give firefighters average 3 percent annual raises from 2009 through 2012, structured equivalent to the raises offered members of the police union, Parker said. It also would have the union agree to proposed changes the city wants to make in health insurance provisions.

Largely, Tucker said, it’s a matter of the city being allowed to purchase less expensive, but comparable, policies for eligible retirees. The city currently is locked into buying policies for retirees that cost up to $17,000 per year.

Parker called agreement to health care changes a “concession” on his union’s part.

LPFA put the proposal up to a membership vote this past Friday, and a majority voted in favor of accepting it, he said.

The Council was briefed on the substance of the proposal last week, in a two-hour closed meeting with Tucker and city negotiators concerning the status of talks with all five city labor unions.

Alderman listed “several” concerns with the LPFA offer, Lombardi said. Primarily, none will agree to approve anything that puts a fixed minimum manning number in place.

Some aldermen also opposed the lack of an agreement on shift reorganization, to a model that uses existing staffing to meet a 10-man minimum while significantly reducing automatic overtime.

“We know, after struggling with this year’s budget, that next year is going to be even tougher. There’s no way the city will be hiring firefighters (if the arbitrator’s minimum manning ruling stands),” Lombardi said. “We need to make some permanent changes ... . I’m all in favor of public safety, because I live in this city, but it’s come to a point where we just can’t afford to do business as usual any more.”

Parker said he’s heard through the grapevine the Council isn’t planning to vote on the mediated proposal soon — and he complained it’s a sign the city is reneging on a deal that its negotiators already committed to.

That’s not true, Tucker said. The negotiators — city labor attorney David Blackley and City Clerk Richard Mullaney — signed a document stating they’d bring the mediated proposal to the Council, just as LPFA executives signed on to take it to their members — but in no way did their signatures constitute the city’s agreement.

Typically in labor-management negotiations, Tucker added, if the sides reach a tentative agreement, they’ll issue a joint statement saying so. That didn’t happen in this case, as Parker contacted the Union-Sun & Journal over the weekend unilaterally. City officials, meanwhile, had been tight-lipped about the proposal because it was considered under negotiation only.

The timing of LPFA’s vote and announcement, so close to Election Day and after multiple Council candidates promised to take a harder line with LPFA, is suspicious, Tucker charged.

“They’re playing games. They know the public is outraged about the 10-man (arbitration) ruling and they’re getting nervous,” he said. “They’re much more comfortable with us giving (10) to them, rather than the arbitrator giving it to them. ... They’re trying to bully us into an agreement. It’s not happening.”

Contact reporter Joyce Miles at 439-9222, ext. 6245.