On Tuesday night, the Davis City Council took a very huge step on the road toward fiscal responsibility – they acknowledged the problem that we face. That is something that this city failed to do for the last two years since the collapse of the financial markets, and even before that when it was clear that the path that we were on was unsustainable.
Unfortunately, what we face will be a long and very arduous task. There were few specifics laid out on how to fix the problems. Nor do I think there is one simple solution to any one problem that we face. However, at this point that is nitpicking.
Now comes the harder parts. First, educating the public. Second, getting buy-in from the employee groups.
Davis residents have lived in a bubble for all too long, sheltered by government jobs, UC Davis and relatively stable housing prices. The immediate fallout of the recession was a deficit that was more nuisance than life-altering. That facade ends today.
With very modest assumptions – the drop of the average rate of return (ARR) from 7.75% to 7.25%, the City of Davis has to find $7 million just to pay its current obligations to its current employees for their retirement. In local government, that is a sizable chunk of change.
On Tuesday night, I mentioned that the city council is going to have to prioritize what we spend money on and figure out which services are the priority and which ones we can cut.
But it is far worse than that. So today I do something I have not done previously, I call on a moratorium on all new spending projects. We send the wrong message when we talk about how broke we are and then launch a spending program for ZipCars or for painting the Water Tank.
Nevermind that those monies come from non-general fund purposes. The public does not distinguish between the money used in one fund from another. They do not understand that the city cannot pay its payroll with the money used to purchase the Zipcar contract or the money used to paint the Water Tank.
They see money used for non-essential purposes, they see waste, and they are probably not wrong.
We have to impose the moratorium, because the next step is going to be the most ugly thing that has ever happened in Davis. We are going to have to look at cutbacks on our parks and greenbelts. We are going to have to cut back on recreational activities that children enjoy like the arts, drama, swimming. We are going to impact people’s very way of suburban life.
We will see roads crumbling with disrepair. We will have cracks in our sidewalks and chasms in our bike lanes. Our greenbaelts will turn brown and be overrun with weeds.
We may have to wait an additional minute for the fire department to show up. We may have street lights that go down. And there will be one fewer police officer patrolling the streets or quieting the disruptive college students.
And when we do that, then you will see not five people in the chambers of city government, but a packed house.
And when the people come and yell and scream because finally the economic crisis is hitting home to them, I hope the Mayor has the courage to look people in the eye and say, we have made unfortunate choices in the past.
We have adopted policies and made promises that were not sustainable. We are obligated to pay our current employees their retirement and benefits.
We have made foolish decisions and you, the voters and taxpayers, have become complacent. You have also been lied to and misled about the severity of this crisis.
But that all ends today. Today we will lay bare the truth for you and we will all join together in sacrifice to fix the problems so that this city does not go bankrupt due to insolvency.
You think that’s hyperbole? Where do you think we’re getting seven million dollars from? We can talk about two-tiered benefits plans, raising the retirement age, increasing the employee contribution, but at the end of the day, we will have to lay off employees which means we will cut back services and raise the costs of providing services.
Council raised the possibility of increasing taxes. The last time council increased taxes the proceeds went to pay for the firefighters’ 38% salary increase. The school district is talking about increasing the parcel tax by $200 to avoid laying off teachers, and do you think the public is going to support increased taxes on top of that to keep a bloated city bureaucracy intact?
Council would not say it on Tuesday night, so I will say it. DCEA (Davis City Employee’s Association), you balked at the modest proposed cuts last time, you are going to pay for that this time and then some. City employees are going to have to join in the sacrifice. That means you will get less pay, no more pay increases, reduced benefits, and you will worker longer and harder.
Tuesday was just the first step. The Davis public has no idea what is in store for them, or how their lives are about to change. Think about all of the city services we take for granted and now imagine them gone.
Imagine that you cannot take your children to swimming lessons or for other recreational activities this summer.
Imagine your neighborhood park closed due to lack of funds for maintenance. Imagine greenbelts returning to native vegetation and turning brown in the summer.
Imagine a different world. That’s where we are headed. How far the Davis Council can go to prevent that, remains to be seen.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
The unions had better negotiate because the alternative is a bankruptcy judge and I guarantee you they don’t want to go that route.
So what can the city manager offer to the employees who fix street lights and sprinklers? If bankruptcy is the stick, lower pay, longer hours and reduced benefits must be the carrot. Who’s gonna bite?
[quote]If bankruptcy is the stick, lower pay, longer hours and reduced benefits must be the carrot. Who’s gonna bite?
[/quote]
I person who wants a JOB. Someone within the city had better step up to the plate and start acting like a boss.
“I person who wants a JOB. Someone within the city had better step up to the plate and start acting like a boss.”
Exactly, there are plenty of people out of a job that would jump at city municipal openings even at lower wage and benefit premiums. Like Craised said, it’s time for our leaders to start acting like a boss even if it means taking the ire of the public workers.
rusty: . . . there are plenty of people out of a job . . .
David: bloated bureaucracy
So you would replace who, *exactly*? Management? Oh no, can’t do that. Start at the top and work down? Never happen. ‘Course if we did go that route, we could probably cull that herd down to a reasonable management team of three people for the entire operation.
Sure, and then put out the word that Davis is hiring replacement workers, ’cause after the bankruptcy – which will extinguish those pesky union contracts – we’d probably be able to sub the work to a number of consulting firms, who’d immediately classify every “employee” working in this town as an “independent contractor”.
Unbelievable savings by crushing organized labor, reorganizing the structure to “privatize” city services, and saving enough so we won’t have to raise the sales tax!! Uncle Grover will be pleased.
So what would you suggest neutral? My focus has always been on reigning in the top salaries.
It might be useful if somebody could review how many positions have been allowed to go unfilled already, as the staff is reduced by attrition and retirements. Perhaps one of the city management folks would like to address this, or contact one of us to give us the information.
dmg: “But it is far worse than that. So today I do something I have not done previously, I call on a moratorium on all new spending projects. We send the wrong message when we talk about how broke we are and then launch a spending program for ZipCars or for painting the Water Tank.”
Amen. ‘Nough said.
dmg: “And when the people come and yell and scream because finally the economic crisis is hitting home to them, I hope the Mayor has the courage to look people in the eye and say, we have made unfortunate choices in the past.
We have adopted policies and made promises that were not sustainable. We are obligated to pay our current employees their retirement and benefits.
We have made foolish decisions and you, the voters and taxpayers, have become complacent. You have also been lied to and misled about the severity of this crisis.”
I don’t think you are going to see a packed house in Council chambers “yelling and screaming” about cuts to services. Give the voters more credit than that. Citizens are tired of paying higher taxes and getting nothing in return for these additional monies. The only gain was to city employees, who received a fatter paycheck/greater benefits. If the City Council/Staff make an honest effort to dig Davis out of the fiscal mess this town is in, I believe residents will understand what needs to be done.
What the citizens will not stand for is an increase in their taxes yet again to pay for the city’s past mistakes/refusal to tell the truth/attempts to push the problem down the road. The city itself – read that to mean city employees – must fix this problem by making steep concessions. In which case citizens will accept that the level of services they have come to expect will have to decrease in order to keep the city solvent.
dmg: “Council raised the possibility of increasing taxes. The last time council increased taxes the proceeds went to pay for the firefighters’ 38% salary increase. The school district is talking about increasing the parcel tax by $200 to avoid laying off teachers, and do you think the public is going to support increased taxes on top of that to keep a bloated city bureaucracy intact?”
Absolutely NOT! If there is any attempt to support increased taxes, I assure you there will be a packed house of screaming and yelling citizens who are righteously outraged at the injustice of such a solution to the city’s fiscal mess of its own making.
dmg: “Council would not say it on Tuesday night, so I will say it. DSEA, you balked at the modest proposed cuts last time, you are going to pay for that this time and then some. City employees are going to have to join in the sacrifice. That means you will get less pay, no more pay increases, reduced benefits, and you will worker longer and harder.”
City employees must become part of the solution. Otherwise, I think citizens are ready to say “take a hike” and “we will hire someone else”. There are plenty of qualified people out of work who are desperate for a job. It is a hirer’s market out there – city employees would do well to remember that…
One additional note – it is my belief that city staff work long and hard. A person can only do so much in one day. If there is too much work to do in one day, it just will not get done. What citizens have to expect is that the city may be less efficient and less sensitive to citizen demands on staff time. I think Davisites will understand this…
dmg: “Imagine a different world. That’s where we are headed. How far the Davis Council can go to prevent that, remains to be seen.”
Another factor that is going to play into all of this is what happens at the state/federal level. Will Brown get his way and end RDAs? Will Brown be able to push state responsibilities onto counties/cities, and will commensurate funding accompany the shift? Will health care reform be repealed or not funded at the national level? What about Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid? Is state pension reform on the horizon? These are inponderables which will have to be factored into the city’s equation to find solutions to its budget deficit…
Reality check folks! The city manager will make the cuts that will make the math work for the staff to report out to the council and you will end up with more expensive retirees leaving early, fewer maintenance workers on the streets and in the parks, and a whole new layer of administration to deal with the contractors that will be hired to mow medians and repair sidewalks.
OK Biddlin, what’s your answer????????????
Don Shor: “It might be useful if somebody could review how many positions have been allowed to go unfilled already, as the staff is reduced by attrition and retirements. Perhaps one of the city management folks would like to address this, or contact one of us to give us the information.”
I may be wrong about this, but I thought I heard Paul Navazio say there were 42 positions in total eliminated over the last two years through attrition/retirement. I believe Navazio’s response was as a result of a question posed by Council member Souza.
I have an idea! To save money the city could shorten the time street lights are on at night. It might not save millions but is a start.
Since the fire department ladders they could be in charge of changing light bulbs in traffic lights and street light. Hmm I wonder if they know how to screw in a light bulb?
We do have a bloated management structure in a number of departments. We pay high salaries (and very expensive benefits) to department heads, and very often those department heads have highly paid deputies (with costly benefits). We probably have one or two extra departments which could be consolidated, eliminating at least some of our top-side cost.
We also have staffing issues in the fire department, especially, where we have 33% more firefighters on the job at all times than is necessary; and we also schedule our firefighters in a stupid way, which guarantees every firefighter and every fire captain at least 8 hours of overtime every fortnight.
However, our problems are much deeper than these sort of positional issues. It’s not about “… reigning in the top salaries,” as David Greenwald states above. It’s about how excessively expensive ALL of the city staff are, including our lowest paid folks. After all, we have a lot more Indians than we have Chiefs.
For example, an entry level landscaper, in addition to his salary, his expensive pension plan (which soon will cost 29% of salary), his massive amounts of paid holidays (14.5 per year), vacation time and sick leave and so on, qualifies immediately for a premium health care package which costs us around $20,000 a year. But not only that, we will need to sock away another $18,000 a year or so just to keep up with the Present Value of his retiree medical care many years down the road. So you take that entry level employee, whose salary is just $36,000 per year*, and before we send CalPERS more than $10,000 extra for his pension, we have spent $38,000 on his medical care for the worker and his family.
When you have roughly 400 full-time workers, and every single one costs $38,000 a year in medical expenses (including the PV of retiree care), you cannot solve your problems simply by reigning in the top end.
*If you look at the salaries of experienced landscape workers in Davis who are employed in the competitive private sector, they make roughly half the salaries of entry-level city workers, and the privates get no benefits. As such, it ends up being the case that we are paying roughly 7 times the total comp per hour than the competitive private sector is paying.
When I repair people’s homes I expect them to pay me for the time I take to figure out what is actually wrong. That is because figuring out, exactly what needs to be done to correct a problem, is usually the most difficult part of the job. Once the problem has been identified, actually doing the repair is relatively easy.
Now, with the new regime in the Council chambers, in harmony, all acknowledging the past mistakes that have lead up to our current fiscal problems, and the need for immediate action, the first step toward solving those problems has been taken. And for the first time, the acting City Manager is on board.
Perhaps, with the proverbial 800 pound budget crisis gorilla out of the closet, City administrators will summon the courage to deliver the data need by the council to make tough decisions. After all, Council members are unpaid, part time public servants who are supposed to make policy decisions based on data provided to them by the people that we pay, full time, to provide that information.
DMG has made it clear on numerous occasions, that the information these administrators are supposed to be providing is frequently not made available to the Council when it is needed. The staff provided data is like the tools for diagnosing the problem, without which Council decisions are made in the dark. Staff failure to keep Council informed bears a lot of the blame for the current budget crisis.
And, there is nothing like a 2X4 upside the head to get ones attention. Council members need to make it abundantly clear too administrators that their jobs are on the line. Excuses from staff are not going to get the budget crisis solved. An unsolved budget crisis means administrators will be looking for a job.
The public is largely uninformed about this crisis. Instead of nice glossy mailers advertising the availability of city services, staff needs to be informing those who don’t have time to read the Vanguard, about the consequences past policy mistakes, the desperate need to avoid bankruptcy, the expected cuts to city services, and ways that citizens can help avoid the draconian service cuts that will invariably lower their property values and standard of living.
Council seems to all be on the same page. Staff is soon to follow suit if they want to keep their jobs. I wonder if some of those citizens who use our greenbelts and parks, enjoy those expensive to maintain areas well enough to donate an occasional Saturday working under staff supervision to help maintain them. Avoiding bankruptcy is going to take sacrifices from us all.
Having Council, staff and citizens all informed and working together is 80% of the job.
[quote]The public is largely uninformed about this crisis. Instead of nice glossy mailers advertising the availability of city services, staff needs to be informing those who don’t have time to read the Vanguard, about the consequences past policy mistakes, the desperate need to avoid bankruptcy,[/quote]
The threat of Bankruptcy is a bargaining tool. The threat of no benefits is what it takes to get unions to negotiate.
It is interesting to read this article, and then pick up my Thursday Davis Enterprise to see the headline: Third Street Up For A Makeover.
Budget for “outreach, planning, and engineering” is $90,000. CalTrans grant will cover $39,900 of that.
Budget for construction: $2 million.
[i]”After all, Council members are unpaid, part time public servants who are supposed to make policy decisions based on data provided to them by the people that we pay, full time, to provide that information.”[/i]
For the record, members of the City Council are paid a small amount, $8,033.88 per year + they have a $2,500 per year “expenditure allowance”(1) + they get a $20,000 per year health care benefit(2) + they get retiree medical for the rest of their lives if they serve at least 5 years and retire from the City of Davis. That’s not anywhere near as much as County Supervisors get for doing roughly the same job, but it is not “unpaid.”
(I don’t know if members of the council get a pension. It is not mentioned in the “council procedures manual.” However, I suspect they do, if they qualify for a CalPERS retirement. So that would mean a current expense for the City of roughly another $2,330 per year for members who qualify.)
[b](1)[/b][i]”The annual city budget also includes an expenditure allowance for expenses necessary for members to undertake official city business. Eligible expenses include membership in professional associations, attendance at conferences or educational seminars, and the purchase of publications and annual subscriptions. In addition, travel expenses including meals (city policy does not allow reimbursement for alcohol) for Council members and mileage reimbursement are made for city business.”[/i]
[b](2)[/b][i] “Council members are also eligible for city-funded participation in group insurance benefits including retirement, medical, dental, vision, and life insurance plans available at the level provided to management employees.”[/i]
[img]http://www.moxleyteam.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/city-of-pleasanton.gif[/img]
There is an interesting story out of Pleasanton ([url]http://www.pleasantonweekly.com/news/show_story.php?id=5972[/url]) today, regarding its labor contracts and how they fund the “employee share” of pension costs. You should understand that in Davis, we have traditionally never charged one cent to our non-safety employees when it came to the “employee share” of their pension costs. Instead, the taxpayers have paid both the employer and employee share. That is starting to change in Davis, but not by much so far: [quote]The PCEA contract has been targeted by a group of Pleasanton residents who are concerned about the city’s unfunded pension liabilities. Depending on whose accounting formula is used, these liabilities range from $121 million to $290 million.
To start closing the gap, the citizens’ group, represented by businessman Bart Hughes, is asking the city to start closing the gap on these unfunded liabilities by requiring employees to pick up a share of pension contributions that the city has fully paid since 2002.
The PCEA contract, negotiated by the city Last summer with a tentative agreement reached last Nov. 9, addresses the issue for the first time, with the city’s unionized employees to contribute 2% of their salaries toward their pension fund, which is handled by the California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS).
But that’s not enough, Hughes and others said Tuesday night. They cited a recent contract between the city and City Manager Nelson Fialho, who voluntarily agreed to fund the full employee share of 8% of his annual compensation. They said by agreeing to these new terms, Fialho recognized the importance of raising all employee contributions, and that the 2% offered by the PCEA is not enough.
[/quote]
[quote]It is interesting to read this article, and then pick up my Thursday Davis Enterprise to see the headline: Third Street Up For A Makeover.
Budget for “outreach, planning, and engineering” is $90,000. CalTrans grant will cover $39,900 of that.
Budget for construction: $2 million.
[/quote]
Yep that is a high cost. If you would like to cut that cost in half lobby the Democrats to abolish the Davis Bacon act. By simply abolishing the Davis Bacon Act would save Billions state wide and millions at the city level.
Actually, I’d like the council to entirely reconsider street-widening projects at the moment. With unfunded maintenance, new projects seem like a lower priority.
Rusty-I wish I had some good answers. I think most established cities have become management and information tech heavy over the last two decades and that is where I would start cutting, and there are lower costs to lay-off management and other exempt(non civil service) who are not yet vested. Then looking at consolidation of facilities and services might render more small savings. Fleet expenses might well be reduced through lease agreements. Contracting out maintenance usually backfires in terms of bang for the buck, because of the cost of oversight and quality of the work delivered.(You have to count the number of reflective dots etc.) It also seems to be a favorite way for the old-boy network to prosper and propagate. But however we slice it up there is going to be pain. It would be nice if management felt a little of it for a change, but historically that doesn’t happen.
[quote]It is interesting to read this article, and then pick up my Thursday Davis Enterprise to see the headline: Third Street Up For A Makeover. [/quote]
Um…didn’t they already “improve” 3rd Street just a few years ago with the “bulbed out” corners (which, IMO, may decrease safety for bicyclists by forcing them into the traffic lanes.)
David Suder–I was downtown this morning and there is a new “bulb out” job going on at all four corners of 2nd & F.
The state of Utah is taking necessary steps. Other states following their lead:
[url]http://www.freedomworks.org/blog/jborowski/utah-shows-how-to-solve-the-looming-public-pension[/url]
Why more of this will be good for Democrats’ political future:
[url]http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704405704576064282100893372.html?KEYWORDS=democrats+unions[/url]
Great comments all, and interesting links. We have to completely change our mentality: no more subsidies for social programs, slash spending, end defined benefit pension plans. More taxing and spending will not fly. We need to pay as we go — no more kicking the can down the road, no more exorbitant salaries and bloated organizational charts.
“no more subsidies for social programs”
The city doesn’t have subsidies for social programs.
[quote]
The city doesn’t have subsidies for social programs. [/quote]
So you are saying that directly or indirectly, the city provides no subsidies whatsoever for social programs?
WASHINGTON, Jan. 21 (UPI) — Washington lawmakers are working behind the scenes to develop a way to let states declare bankruptcy and get out from under large debts, political insiders say.
Municipalities can declare bankruptcy protection, but states cannot, The New York Times reported.
Bankruptcy lawyers who have been consulted by Congressional aides said some members of Congress fear it is only a matter of time before a state seeks a bailout.
Bankruptcy could also allow a state alter contractual promises to retirees and could provide an alternative to a no-strings bailout, the report said.
Besides potentially hurting retirees, bankruptcy for states could damage bond markets.
“All of a sudden, there’s a whole new risk factor,” said Paul S. Maco, who was head of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of Municipal Securities during the Clinton administration.
No potential state bankruptcy bill has been formulated and no members of Congress have come forward as a sponsor, but Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, asked Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke about the possibility of a hearing this month, the Times said.
Critics of a state bankruptcy law say it could give governors and others more leverage in bargaining with unionized public workers.
“They are readying a massive assault on us,” said Charles M. Loveless, legislative director of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. “We’re taking this very seriously.”
“”They are readying a massive assault on us,”
I was thinking: “The public employees unions have been assaulting tax payers for the last decade.”
This is a problem of unions, not public-sector employees. Historically unions had formed for bargaining power with company ownership over job conditions and pay. As “we the people” are the owners of government, public employee unions are in conflict with the public and are harmful to the democratic process and are unneccesary. I read that the GOP sees an opening here to pass Federal legislation that makes it illegal to form unions when the employer is government. I am looking for that article to post a link. The court challenges would be epic, but legal scholars on both sides of the isle note there are strong arguments for the case. The only reason this has not been attempted before is the private-sector unions would rally in support of their brothers and sisters working in the public-sector. Today there is rift and it is growing. Private-sector union members are noting the huge and growing gap between their pay and benefits compared to their peers working for government… AND they are starting to understand that they are paying for it.
More and more I think bankruptcy is the only way out of this mess.
rusty49: I agree and have said so. It is interesting that Valejo did not renegotiate their contracts as they seemed to have the ability to do so as a result of their bankruptcy case. I am still perplexed about this.
As an aside, isn’t it interesting that the main media template that has played out is how corporate money-GOP partnership corrupts the democratic process, and how those greedy CEO bastards have ruined the economy, and meanwhile there has been barely a whimper about the growing budget disaster caused by union-Democrat arrangement? We have all these activist wringing their hands over Citizens United, meanwhile the public union continue to bankrupt cities, states and the country.
DG: [i]”The city doesn’t have subsidies for social programs.”[/i]
MH: [i]”So you are saying that directly or indirectly, the city provides no subsidies whatsoever for social programs?”[/i]
David has this wrong, though it is true that most of that spending is outside the general fund.
The city has spent more than $10 million a year combined on child care programs, low-income senior programs and of course a good amount on low-income housing programs for many years. The amount used to be higher before the economy tanked.
You can see the numbers in the budget summary for this fiscal year (see page 7) ([url]http://cityofdavis.org/finance/budget/10-11/pdfs/03.-Budget-Summary-Final-10_11.pdf[/url]).
Don Shor: “It is interesting to read this article, and then pick up my Thursday Davis Enterprise to see the headline: Third Street Up For A Makeover.
Budget for “outreach, planning, and engineering” is $90,000. CalTrans grant will cover $39,900 of that.
Budget for construction: $2 million.”
I had the same reaction – it is unreal that the city would be going forward w a taxpayer funded $2 million makeover of a couple of blocks of city street – as if there were no recession. This is the very thing that outrages taxpayers, and makes them refuse to increase/extend taxes. Doesn’t matter which pot of money the funding is coming from – bc it is coming ultimately from the taxpayers’ collective pockets…
[quote]The city has spent more than $10 million a year combined on child care programs, low-income senior programs and of course a good amount on low-income housing programs for many years.[/quote]
Thank you Mr. Rifkin. $10 million plus BEFORE counting low income housing programs. Lets get serious here — before bring new parcel taxes to our stressed families, we should flat out eliminate all of discretionary spending categories. How can we be talking default and bankruptcy when we can trim millions.
Mh53: “Thank you Mr. Rifkin. $10 million plus BEFORE counting low income housing programs. Lets get serious here — before bring new parcel taxes to our stressed families, we should flat out eliminate all of discretionary spending categories. How can we be talking default and bankruptcy when we can trim millions.”
The problem is many people see these programs/subsidies/discretionary spending as “essential”…
“The budget should be balanced, public debt should be reduced, the treasury should be rebuilt, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and assistance to foreign hands should be curtailed, lest Rome fall.”
Cicero
Straight from a Democrat politician in the know:
[url]http://wallstcheatsheet.com/breaking-news/letter-to-the-editor-public-employee-unions-must-be-banned-from-endorsing-politicians-who-negotiate-their-contracts.html[/url]
I especially find this statement interesting:
[quote]”In the heavily-unionized states, candidates for governor, state senator, state representative, mayor, city council, school board, commissioner, auditor, treasurer, sheriff, prosecuting attorney and judge fight for endorsements that come with fat campaign contributions and volunteers to man phone banks, and to distribute yard signs and literature.[/quote]
The last point gets ignored in the calculation of campaign spending; however, it is a very big deal. Note that Meg had to hire most of the labor needed to do this work, while Brown benefited from thousands of motivated free resources. For example, who paid for 1,000 unionized nurses to attend and disrupt a political rally for Whitman?
Incredible link Mr. Boone. Everyone should read it. Thank you.
[quote]The problem is many people see these programs/subsidies/discretionary spending as “essential”… [/quote]
How true Mr. Musser. The demand for public support can never be satiated. When we reinforce dependency, we get more of it. Who wants to pay rent when they can have it paid by taxpayers.
[quote]The New York Times reported in May 2010 that Hugo Tassone, a retired New York patrol officer, was earning $101,333 a year for life after he left three years ago at age 44. Tassone wasn’t the chief, a deputy chief, a captain, a lieutenant or a sergeant. He was a patrol officer.[/quote] LOL
I assumed, reading that quote about Hugo Tassone that he must have been disabled on the job. I could not imagine otherwise. But I looked it up and was surprised to find, no, his “retirement” at age 44 was normal in his department.
Source ([url]http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2010/08/08/2010-08-08_how_public_worker_pensions_are.html[/url]): [quote]At 44, Hugo Tassone retired from the Yonkers police force with an annual pension of $101,333 – thanks to overtime pay he tacked on to his $74,000 salary. [u]Tassone told The New York Times it was the pension he could collect after 20 years of service that attracted him to the job in the first place[/u].
He’s not alone. In the last decade, [u]half of the police and firefighters who retired in Yonkers collected pensions that exceeded their base pay, in (at least one case) by as much as 75%[/u].
Don’t blame the officers. New York’s pension rules make it pay more to retire than to work. And the horrible habits here are a window on a national pension picture that’s looking more disastrous by the day.
Tacking on overtime is only one of a long list of union-won perks behind New York’s rising pension burden. To dodge a federal law capping public pensions to $195,000 a year, in 1997, Albany created a second fund for “excess benefits.” Twenty-eight New York employees, nearly all teachers, exploited the loophole, leaving taxpayers with a $6 million check this year alone.
These and other sweeteners are part of the reason why the city’s annual pension payout has increased 900% since 2000. And that’s before health care benefits are included. For every dollar police officers contribute to their retirement, taxpayers contribute nine. Mayor Bloomberg’s office warns that if one thing pushes New York City into bankruptcy again – 35 years after the last time – it will be pensions. [/quote]
Another nice example…
[quote]Last year Heather Fong retired as San Francisco’s $324,567 a year police chief after 32 years on-the-job. Fong cashed in her unused vacation time, sick time and comp time (calculated at time-and-a-half) at a rate of about $156 an hour instead of the rate she earned the unused time as a lower-ranking cop. This means, as an example, that if Fong earned 100 hours in unused vacation time at $20 an hour 30 years ago, she cashed it in for $156 an hour 30 years later. Not only did she walk away with over $300,000 in cash, but Fong also got a lifelong pension that’s worth $266,000 a year for the 55-year-old retiree, and she isn’t alone.
A report this year from the city of San Francisco’s civil grand jury entitled, “Pension Tsunami: The Billion Dollar Bubble,” identified 900 retired city workers who are currently earning $100,000 annually, and more, for life.[/quote]
When you are allowed to retire before age 65 it is a paid vacation. Another sucky thing about all of this… public-sector employees tend to get more paid holidays, more sick leave and more vacation leave than their peers in the private sector. They also have the type of job security that allows them to work entitled to it… requiring the organization to over-staff to provide the necessary backup coverage… or as is the other standard… just ignore the fact that the service level drops when they are away.
Compared to their private-sector peers, public sector jobs are typically less competitive, less stressful… there is more job security, greater leave time, greater benefits and greater pay. Then after having this better job, the public-sector employee gets to “retire” at age 44, 50 or 55 for a decade or two of a paid vacation complements of all the tax payers struggling to make ends meet.
[i]”When you are allowed to retire before age 65 it is a paid vacation.”[/i]
What would you call it if you got paid $178,767 a year (plus benefits) as a fire captain in Davis and you were only scheduled to work 85.5 days a year (minus sick leave and or jury duty), and those days you “worked” you were paid to sleep 8 hours a night, and we almost never have a dangerous structure fire in Davis? Sounds like a paid vacation to me.
I heard a story recently about the brother of a friend of mine who is a fire captain for the Los Angeles County Fire Department. I heard from a different friend that the Captain, who is 44 years old, had opened a restaurant not too far away in Orange County. I asked, “He quit the LACFD?” I was then told, “Nope, he has plenty of time to run the restaurant on his 20 days off a month, plus his 24 days of paid vacation, plus holidays. If he needs to, he can take a sick day to manage his restaurant.”
We are we talking about a town in Greece or Davis California?
Don Shor writes:
“Actually, I’d like the council to entirely reconsider street-widening projects at the moment. With unfunded maintenance, new projects seem like a lower priority.”
I agree and wonder: What’s the justification…in the middle of The Great Recession? Where’s the money coming from? Is this a done deal, or can the City Council take a vote and stop this costly cosmetic alteration of Third Street, which has functioned just fine all these years? ($2 million would go a ways toward positively dealing with the budget crisis.) What concrete benefit is there to balance/justify such a huge expenditure?
[quote]To dodge a federal law capping public pensions to $195,000 a year, in 1997, Albany created a second fund for “excess benefits.” Twenty-eight New York employees, nearly all teachers, exploited the loophole, leaving taxpayers with a $6 million check this year alone. [/quote]
LOL
The stories about the pensions of Tassone and Fong just blow the mind! No wonder this country is in pension Hell…
Did our forefathers intend for those who do not contribute to have the power to vote themselves free stuff? make no mistake, it is a painful question but one that needs to be asked.
“Did our forefathers intend for those who do not contribute to have the power to vote themselves free stuff?”
The discussions leading to the design of our great system of governance included a lot of hand wringing about the destructive “tyranny of the majority” tendencies of pure democracy. Our framers feared this as much as they feared the development of an autocracy or plutocracy. Thus they designed our representative form of democracy with all its checks and balances.
What they could not have envisioned is a vast and pervasive 24×7 entertainment-media machine that has become the ultimate broker of both political power and cultural change. The way is suppose to work: candidates propose and debate ideas to influence voters and politicians propose and debate ideas to influence policy… and the media (historically the press) reports it. They way it works today: the media influences voters and policy directly and indirectly.
There is a journalism code of ethics, and it is completely disregarded by all of the most highly regarded reporters and talking heads. They opine when they should report. They seek popularity and wealth at the expense of a country in need of objective and fact-based content to help them decipher the rights and wrongs of an increasingly complex world. Today journalists obfuscate the truth. They more market their own convictions and ideas than do they report with fact-based objectivity to help a reader/viewer decide. The new media is even more sinister; under the guise of reporting and news, it propagandizes content to achieve ideological goals. George Soros, for example, uses the wealth earned from hedge funds to fund media business… not to make more weatlth, but to influnce political outcomes.
No longer are we a largely thinking people supplemented by freedom of the press. Instead, we are a biased and polarized people brainwashed by purchase of media time.
Every person should pay tax if any person must pay tax. This will prevent the poor from voting themselves more freed stuff as they are helping to pay for it. We should revisit the original intent of the First Amendment, separate reporting media from propaganda or political marketing, and start to hold journalists responsible for their performance relative to their own code of ethics.
[quote]Every person should pay tax if any person must pay tax. This will prevent the poor from voting themselves more freed stuff as they are helping to pay for it.[/quote]
Fantastic point.