New Long Beach Police Union Contract's Taxpayer Cost: $6.2 Mil This Year, $14.3 Mil In Three Years; Mgm't Says It'll Pay This Year's Cost In Part By Taking "Less Conservative Budgetary Actions," Leaves Future Years' Impacts To Future "Budget Processes"
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(Jan. 30, 2017, 7:05 p.m.) -- Long Beach taxpayers learned today (Jan. 30) how much their City Councilmembers offered, and the Long Beach police officers union's members voted to accept, in a new three year contract: $6.2 million net fiscal impact to the General Fund in FY 17, with $14.3 million to the General Fund at the end of the three-year agreement.
The "Fiscal Impact" section of city management's agendizing memo tells the public there'll be "no impact" in the current FY17 budget year because management plans to cover this year's cost of the contract in part by "taking less conservative budgetary actions" that include reducing funding "for unfunded retirement liabilities" [that taxpayer advocates have described as an upcoming pension tsunami]...and leaves the new contract's costs for next year and future years to "annual budget processes."
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The city release indicates that the new contract includes a 3% general salary increase for a total 9% increase over three years, plus increased skill pays, fewer maximum "bankable" overtime hours, and an agreement to continue discussions regarding overtime assignments and modifying the police training program to increase the number of officers in patrol. Health care changes are also included that the city release says will help "stabilize health benefit costs and provide long-term savings for the city."
City management previously indicated that raises in new collective bargaining agreements weren't included in the Council's publicly approved FY17 budget. City management's agendizing memo (signed by Dir. of Human Resources Alejandrina Basquez and co-signed as approved by City Manager Pat West) states in its "Fiscal Impact" saction that it projects no FY17 impact because this year's costs "will be covered by higher than expected revenues, vacancy savings, and additional funding achieved from taking less conservative budgetary actions such as reducing charges for insurance and funding for unfunded retirement liabilities." As for next year and forthcoming years: "Costs for FY 18 and FY 19 will be addressed as part of those annual budget processes..."
In addition to the memo's Fiscal Impact information above, Assistant City Finance Dir. Lea Eriksen tells LBREPORT.com that "Measure A revenues will not be used to fund the increases."
The LB Police Officers Association was the largest single contributor ($225,000 as of June 30, 2016) to the Measure A sales tax increase. Voters approved the measure roughly 60% to 40% citywide after being shown a ballot title and text that stated: "[all caps in original] "CITY OF LONG BEACH PUBLIC SAFETY, INFRASTRUCTURE REPAIR AND NEIGHBORHOOD SERVICES MEASURE. To maintain 911 emergency response services; increase police, firefighter/paramedic staffing; repair potholes/streets; improve water supplies; and maintain general services..."
City management has elsewhere indicated that it expects Measure A will produce roughly $48 million per year in General Fund revenue for City Hall in its first six years (before by its terms it drops to half.) City Hall wrote Measure A as a general tax increase, whose revenue goes to LB's General Fund that a Council majority can spend for any General Fund purposes.
In its FY17 budget (adopted Sept. 2016), Councilmembers voted to restore 10 police officers out of roughly 200 officers that previous Councils had erased since FY10. The Council voted reductions in police officers for taxpayers wasn't publicly opposed by LBPOA's leadership, and its political action committee endorsed a number of Council incumbents (including Mayoral-candidate Garcia) who voted for the police reductions. Long Beach City Hall currently provides its taxpayers with a budgeted police level available for citywide deployment roughly equivalent per capita to what Los Angeles would have if it erased over 25% of LAPD's officers.
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As previously reported by LBREPORT.com, in December 2016 city management told the City Council's Public Safety Committee (Price, Austin, Supernaw) that it has no current plan to provide further police officers for the public beyond what the Council budgeted for FY17...but indicated management would provide the Council with some options in January 2017 [to our knowledge none described publicly to date.]
In his Jan. 13, 2017 State of the City message, Mayor Garcia offered no plan for providing additional police officers but indicated that as a newly named member of the Metropolitan Transportation Agency governing board, he will support a proposal to have LBPD officers handle policing on the Blue Line in Long Beach, which he said could result in up to 30 LBPD officers handling Blue Line tasks "paid for" by Metro. However the Mayor didn't indicate from where those up-to-30 officers would come.
On Jan. 15, 2017, LBREPORT.com learned and reported that Metro envisions using 14 LBPD officers. In response to our inquiry, LBPD management told LBREPORT.com that those officers for Metro-contracted would be drawn from other LB policing tasks and would be covered with "overtime." [LBREPORT.com coverage here.]
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LBREPORT.com provides the full text of the City of Long Beach's release text on the new contract follows below:
The City of Long Beach has reached a tentative three-year agreement with the Police Officers Association (POA) to bring pay in line with other agencies competing for quality police officers. The agreement also sets a new cap for overtime hours and reforms health care costs that will provide long-term savings to the City.
Market analysis has determined that of the 10 comparable agencies, Long Beach consistently ranked at the bottom and more than 10 percent behind today’s median pay for a Police Officer.
"Public safety is the highest priority for the City of Long Beach, and in order to achieve our objectives we rely on a dedicated and well-trained police workforce," said Mayor Robert Garcia. "This tentative agreement provides our Police Officers with modest wage and skill pay increases that will allow us to retain quality Officers and attract new recruits to our Police Department in a very competitive job market. I want to thank the POA leadership and the City negotiating team for their hard work to come to an agreement."
The last increase in compensation for Long Beach Police Officers was 1 percent in 2014. Prior to that, the POA had negotiated with the City to contribute 9 percent of salary as part of pension reform negotiations.
"I want to thank the Mayor, City Council, and City Management for demonstrating their commitment to public safety," said Steve James, POA President. "The agreement was reached through a collaborative process, with the intention of making sure we maintain the high quality Police Department the citizens of Long Beach expect and deserve."
The tentative agreement includes the following changes to address issues of recruitment and retention of Police Officers, as well as reducing the number of overtime hours a Police Officer can accrue and have employees pay more for health care costs:
Three-year contract term;
3 percent general salary increase each year for a total of 9 percent increase over three years;
Increase in skill pays to help the City recruit a qualified and diverse Department and retain Police Officers;
Decrease in the maximum number of overtime hours Police Officers can bank;
Agreement to continue discussions regarding overtime assignments and modifying the police training program in order to increase the number of Police Officers in Patrol; and
Health care reform provisions that help stabilize health benefit costs and provide long-term savings for the City.
The POA membership voted overwhelmingly to ratify the tentative agreement during the last two weeks of January. The agreement will now go before the City Council for public discussion and final approval on February 7, 2017.
The City of Long Beach and POA representatives held more than 13 meet and confer meetings since May 2016 prior to reaching agreement. The tentative agreement would be effective through September 30, 2019.
This agreement would have a total estimated annual net fiscal impact of $6.2 million in the General Fund in FY 17, and $14.3 million in the General Fund at the end of the three-year agreement.
The POA represents approximately 800 Long Beach Police Officers.
