Mayor Joe Krovoza has confirmed with the Vanguard that the numbers that were reported for the city manager’s contract were erroneous. According to him, “The term ‘gross wages’ is what should have been used.”
Mayor Pro Tem Rochelle Swanson called, the evening he was hired, specifically to highlight this point.
Unfortunately, they are indeed untrue figures. Rich Rifkin reports in his column that, according to HR Director Melissa Chaney, “That (news release) was put out by the City Council. Staff had nothing to do with it. The number,” she paused, “it’s not true. They mixed up gross salary with total compensation. They did not compare total comp with total comp.”
The real number is that the new City Manager will get $44,000 more than Bill Emlen, not $3500. His salary marks an increase of $29,300 over Bill Emlen’s salary of $148,700.
Clearly, the Vanguard should have double-checked the number, especially since the latter point was known.
Mr. Rifkin calls this a lie. I think that goes too far. A lie is an intentional misstatement. I think this comes down to a mistake – one that should have been avoided, especially since a number of people read over the press release before it was sent out and not one caught it.
In fact, no one seemed to catch it for nearly a week. Yesterday, Sue Greenwald reported, “This information is completely incorrect, David. Human resources calculated the total compensation, and it is about $40,000 higher than Bill Emlen’s. The total compensation is $281, 877.”
But even Councilmember Greenwald had failed to note this until a week later.
The secondary question is whether this is still the right hire.
Ms. Greenwald argues, “Of course we could have found a competent city manager for far less.”
“This is the same old, same old. Nothing changes. We talk about sustainable budgets, but we do not change our practices,” she added.
Mr. Rifkin has a different view, “To my mind, it is a big deal that the City Council lied when announcing the hiring of Pinkerton. On the other hand, I don’t think the fact Pinkerton will be paid $44,300 more than Emlen made two years ago is necessarily bad.
Again, I think “lied” is a tough statement to sustain, as it requires evidence of intentional deceit.
However, regarding his other point, I have a mixed view.
On the one hand, as Mr. Rifkin argues, “If he figures good ways to save the taxpayers of Davis millions of dollars per year and proves himself to be an excellent personnel manager, the additional money he will cost will be worth it.”
He also notes, “Yet it is not hard to notice how much higher Pinkerton’s compensation will be than the state pays its top managers.”
This parallels Sue Greenwald’s argument, “Top state management who manage departments with budgets 6 times ours make $126,000. Top state managers who manage budgets [of] 13 billion dollars make between $136,00 and $155,000. And their benefits are less. I know some of these people, and they are among the highest quality managers you can find.”
But that is not the full story either. Mr. Pinkerton will still be on the low end of what city managers make across the state and the $188,000 is less than half what other top executives, such as the UCD chancellor, make.
It is still a difficult question for me. I think Mr. Rifkin’s reasoning is sound that a good city manager could find ways to save millions for the city. I am not convinced we would have found a good city manager for a lot less.
And yet, I am bothered by a $44,000 increase at the same time the council is asking workers making far less to make sacrifices. So, we expect the employees to do so, but not Mr. Pinkerton? Doesn’t seem fair to me and more importantly the employees will undoubtedly see it as less than fair.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
“And yet, I am bothered by a $44,000 increase at the same time the council is asking workers making far less to make sacrifices. So, we expect the employees to do so, but not Mr. Pinkerton? Doesn’t seem fair to me and more importantly the employees will undoubtedly see it as less than fair.”
Might make it tougher to cry poor mouth at contract time !
The key point is this: How can the City expect its employees to take a pay cut of any kind, when they have just hired a new city manager with a salary $44,000 higher than the last one? What kind of a message does that send? Again, the CC is still caught up in the “keeping up w the Jones” mentality, which is going to be the City’s financial ruin…
This is fair.
Here’s a bit more. With regard to pay, gross wages are what potential employees looks at in evaluating any offer, then the pension benefit, retiree heath, insurance, etc. are factors. The council focused on gross wages as we negotiated. Former CM Bill Emlen’s gross wages from his last full year (2009) were a key baseline we consulted. We didn’t confuse this with what’s commonly referred to as Total Comp, which is the total annual budget cost to the city of an employee. Total Comp is calculated from a number for factors, the largest of which is base salary.
The gross wages delta between Emlen 2009 and Steve Pinkerton will be $3500 at most. Bill Emlen took the City’s cafeteria cash-out for $15K+, increasing his gross wages over his salary. Our new City Manager won’t take the cash-out since his family will accept the healthcare insurance of the City. For this and other reasons including the higher base, the gross wages delta does translate into a Total Comp delta of over $40K. It was a Vanguard writer who first suggested to me that others were reading our press release to say that the Total Comp delta was $3500. Given the phrasing of the release, that is fair. See below. Those that wrote and proofed the release, just didn’t catch that when we used “total compensation” in the last sentence of the paragraph that would suggest a Total Comp comparison. That was a mistake; there was no intent to mislead. I certainly understand now that the release mislead. I was one of the writers and proofers. I regret this error because the purpose of the paragraph was to succinctly set out what we had negotiated, which I do believe was very solid work by our Council.
For what it’s worth, and as reported when the council set a salary range for the city manager position a few weeks ago, the average salary for a city manager in our region and for cities of a comparable size, is $216,000. This was the best number our search firm could come up with when we requested such. Many numbers can be used. We could have said our salary delta was -$28,000 compared to our peer group. I don’t think that would have been fair to use, but there are lots of angles here.
I am excited that Steve Pinkerton is joining us. He’s going to be super and he brings a great diversity of talents and accomplishments. I have been receiving unsolicited congratulations from across the state from people who have worked with Steve and have heard that he’s our new city manager.
Here’s the paragraph on compensation from the press release.
[quote]Pinkerton’s salary, as proposed, will be $188,000 per year. The proposed contract includes provisions that he will pay two percent of the eight percent employee contribution towards his pension and is required to take three unpaid furlough days in the upcoming fiscal year. Steve Pinkerton’s salary and benefits may be modified to maintain consistency with changes in compensation for all management employees. He will not receive any city contribution towards a deferred compensation plan and will not receive any auto or technology allowance. The contract is similar in structure to Bill Emlen’s, and its total compensation will, at most, represent a $3,500 increase over Emlen’s last full year of 2009.[/quote]
Why don’t you ever compare salaries to what public school teachers make, or should make. Or, what university professors in the social sciences and the humanities make or should make? People who are teaching the next generations about history, world religions and other cultures, science, literature, and government and much more…critical thinking skills. I could go on… Why is the ability to manage held it such high esteem. Many people in many different kinds of jobs “manage” and don’t get paid specifically to do so. What do Management Schools teach? Of course, corporate CEOs manage to pollute, dissemble, twist arms, lie, defraud, break rules and regulations with impunity and walk away the richer for it.
My “This is fair.” refers to David’s main piece.
To ERM: We are considerably below the Jones. Sorry I didn’t get my response posted first. Should we/could we be even further below the Jones? …the debate will continue.
[quote]Why don’t you ever compare salaries to what public school teachers make, or should make. Or, what university professors in the social sciences and the humanities make or should make?[/quote]
City workers are overpaid imho. THis has been much discussed on the Vanguard. Police officers and firefighters can retire early in very generous pensions. I just spoke with two academic researchers (Ph.D’s but not profs) at UCSB and UCSD last week and was appalled by their salaries–in the 70s! Both have dozens of publications in the sciences (not social sciences or humanities) and are recognized as leading researchers in their respective fields. Both have over three decades of experience post-PhD.
Is that fair? No.
So what is to be done? If we need to pay a higher salary to get someone really good I do think its worth it, though I am worried about the signal this send to other employees in Davis.
Am I happy about this state of affairs? No. But I don’t think the City should shoot itself in the foot. Could we get other competent people from other disciplines? Probably, but if you are hiring a City manager you look for people with experience in that field which means the salary range needs to be competitive.
To Joe Krovoza: I appreciate the explanation… but I think bargaining w city employees is going to be a lot tougher in light of the new City Mgr’s salary increase… let’s see… I’m ever the optimist.
Two articles (with comments from two City Council members) and Pinkerton’s total compensation is still not clear.
Is Sue’s number of $281,877 accurate? If so, how do you get there from $188,000 gross (assuming this number is even accurate).
[b]DG:[/b] [i]”I think ‘lied’ is a tough statement to sustain, as it requires evidence of intentional deceit.[/i]
It was intentional. It was deceitful. The press release quoting that very misleading number was designed [b]to sell[/b] the hiring of Mr. Pinkerton. That makes it a lie.
ERM: [i]”How can the City expect its employees to take a pay cut of any kind, when they have just hired a new city manager with [b]a salary $44,000 higher[/b] than the last one?”[/i]
If we freeze the cm’s salary and fail to hire a person like Steve Pinkerton, who has a strong record as a city manager who is tough, we will cost ourselves millions more down the road. On the other hand, by giving the new cm more than the old, we do just what you say: we give employees an excuse to not take lower wages.
FWIW, Pinkerton’s [b]salary[/b] will be higher by $29,300. The $44,300 number is the difference in total compensation* for Pinkerton’s first year on the job, not salary.
Here is the equation in simple terms: salary + pension cost to the city + cafeteria benefits:
[b]Emlen:[/b] $158,700 + $32,600 + $17,286 = $208,587.
[b]Pinkerton:[/b] $188,000 + $45,154 + $19,769 = $252,923.
*I noted in my column that I did not include every item in total comp. I left out things like Medicare, worker’s comp, life insurance, long-term disability insurance, survivor’s benefits and so on for the sake of simplicity. Leaving these things out did not change the story, because they have not materially changed since Emlen was the city manager.
[b]JOE K:[/b] [i]”The gross wages delta between Emlen 2009 and Steve Pinkerton will be $3500 at most.”[/i]
I don’t need to repeat my entire column to refute this. Just know that this is a MEANINGLESS sentence.
[i]”Bill Emlen took the City’s cafeteria cash-out for $15K+, increasing his gross wages over his salary.”[/i]
In cash terms, that does not change anything. In other words, the $15,000 that we paid directly to Emlen, we will instead spend on Pinkerton’s health care and dental package for him and his family.
The only real difference is that since 2009, the basic plan HMO premiums have increased by 14.36% ([url]http://www.calpers.ca.gov/index.jsp?bc=/about/press/pr-2011/june/calpers-board-adopts.xml[/url]). For that reason, our cash cost for the cafeteria benefit for Mr. Pinkerton will be $2,482 more than it was for Mr. Emlen.
Because Joe Krovoza did not give us a line-item accounting for his press release, it’s impossible to know where his $3,500 figure comes from. However, I infer from what Melissa Chaney told me (and that one other top level city executive suggested) that Mr. Krovoza also credited Mr. Emlen’s “gross salary” number with the cash-out Emlen took for two weeks of management leave and one week of vacation leave. If so, that is yet one more mistake. Why? Because Mr. Pinkerton will also qualify for those cash-outs, and he will likely take them in January, 2012.
[i]”Those that wrote and proofed the release, just didn’t catch that when we used “total compensation” in the last sentence of the paragraph that would suggest a Total Comp comparison. That was a mistake; there was no intent to mislead. I certainly understand now that the release mislead. I was one of the writers and proofers.”[/i]
I think this is a bad precedent, having the mayor and his allies on the council write press releases, when the city has professionals on staff who can do some fact checking. Ms. Chaney told me explicitly that staff was not consulted.
Joe has apologized for his “mistake.” I’m sure everyone accepts his apology. I certainly do, not that he needs to apologize to me. But lets hope that this is a lesson for the future: that elected officials with a strong point of view who are trying to sell their ideas should not be writing press releases on behalf of the city if they are not willing to have professionals like Melissa Chaney and Paul Navazio go over their numbers and make sure they make good sense and are free of errors.
I don’t want to make it sound like I am above making mistakes. I make them all the time. Yet I know when I do, I can turn to experts on the city staff to set me straight, and I will correct the record.
One more point: I have waited more than a year for the mayor and the mayor pro-tem to take an action which speaks to their claims of being fiscally responsible. Monday morning, they did this. They accepted my suggestion of making Mr. Pinkerton pay the full employee share for his pension–doing so as a precedent for changes coming in the 2012 contracts. I will no longer say Joe and Roe have not lived up to their claims. This was a huge step–it took all day Monday to get it done and forced me to re-write my entire column!!!–and it will result in saving Davis around $6 million per year once it is fully adopted by all non-safety employees.
I would say the city council majority has just boxed itself in with the unions. By pushing the cuts forward, and then increasing the city manager’s compensation, I suspect there will be virtually no yielding on wages or benefits when the union contracts come up. Thus there will almost surely be layoffs this fall, and next fall.
David, would you have let the old council slide on this (supposed) mistake?
[i]” I suspect there will be virtually no yielding on wages or benefits when the union contracts come up.”[/i]
This would be true if the council did not have the authority to impose its terms on the labor groups*. Fortunately, state law allows the city to make a good faith offer or offers over the period of negotiating time. If the parties do not agree on terms–as happened in 2009-19 with one of the city’s labor groups, the council’s “last, best offer” will take effect.
In that sense it is pretty much how most any company in Davis deals with its employees. The boss imposes the terms; the workers have the right to quit, accept the offer or to go on strike. However, it is illegal for most public safety employees to strike. State law explicitly forbids firefighters to strike. It is less clear with the police, though there are a number of court decisions which have found that any public safety worker strikes are illegal ([url]http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civica/filebank/blobdload.asp?BlobID=22772[/url]): [quote]… in City of Santa Ana v. Santa Ana Police Benevolent Association, 207 Cal.App.3d 1568 (1989), police officers challenged the County Sanitation decision, arguing that it should be read to require a case-by-case analysis of whether strike-related activities should be prohibited. Instead, the court concluded that [b]police strikes are per se illegal[/b], noting that “repeated references [in County Sanitation] to strikes by police officers as ones which would still be prohibited lead us to conclude that police work stoppages are still per se illegal” because “application of such a test to police functions would be an impossible task for the trier of fact.” Id. at 1572. [/quote] *Note that there are only a couple of “unions.” The others are organized as “groups” or “associations.” Exactly what difference that makes I do not know.
Correction: “as happened in [b]2009-10[/b] with one of the city’s labor groups …”
[quote]But even Councilmember Greenwald had failed to note this until a week later—David Greenwald[/quote]David, this is completely unfair. I was [b]NOT[/b] part of the negotiating team. The negotiating team was Joe and Rochelle. I had [b]NOT[/b] even seen the the draft contract until it was thrown in front of me at the closed session. I did not get confirmation from staff that the comparison figures were wrong until shortly before the last meeting on August 1.
I had strongly opposed total compensation higher than that of Bill Emlen’s both in closed session and in open session at every step of the process.
Here is the long version of my thoughts on the matter (feel free to skip it):
The rest of the council argues that we should benchmark our city manager positions against those of other small cities. This is the same argument that the council majority used when they instituted the disastrous enhanced early retirement formula — other cities do it so we have to follow them or the city will be uncompetitive.
I have never bought this argument. I personally know many brilliant, underemployed, highly educated people in Davis who would be happy to take these jobs at 2% at 60 or even 2% at 65 if that is what it takes to make our benefits sustainable (and I do believe in decent benefits). For the generalist positions, I think they could be brought up to speed very quickly.
As David noted, I presented a comparison of state management positions and local government management positions that illustrates how absurdly off-scale local management compensation packages are. I am going to post these again to highlight the difference:
Top state management who manage agencies with budgets 6 times ours make about $126,000. Top state managers who manage budgets [of] 13 billion dollars make between about $136,00 and $155,000. And their benefits are less. I know some of these people, and they are among the highest quality managers you can find.
Local government management compensation is equally off-scale compared to federal management positions.
Additionally, management compensation in small local agencies is off-scale compared to big city management compensation. We collect revenue on a per-capita basis. If we can afford a city manager who makes $188,000 in base salary alone, then the City of Sacramento would be able to afford a city manager making $1,400,000 in base salary. The new Sacramento city manager contract will be announced shortly. I guarantee you it will not be $1.4 million (although it will still be far higher than comparable state and federal management pay).
Even the head of our parks and (very small) social services department makes more than the executive directors of major state agencies.
In terms of attracting and retaining quality employees, I don’t see much difference between the state management and the much higher paid local management. There will always be the excellent and the weak; there will always be those who stay for the long haul and those who leave quickly for higher paid jobs.
Oversized management compensation is as big a fiscal problem for small cities and towns as are the unsustainable enhanced benefits and public safety compensation packages. They will all have to be brought under control if we are going to stay solvent.
That said, I am excited about our new city manager and expect great things from him. (For the record, I shared my philosophy about outsized local government management compensation with all the applicants that I personally spoke with – this concern is not directed at any individuals specifically).
Links to pages/documents to which you refer? Thanks.
Who wrote the “council news release”?
Who wrote the contract the council approved? Who reviewed it for content, legal issues, etc. before the council got it in draft and/or final form?
How much time did the council have to read the contract before they met do consider it, revise it, approve it? Who briefed them on what it meant?
[b][quote]”In cash terms, that does not change anything. In other words, the $15,000 that we paid directly to Emlen, we will instead spend on Pinkerton’s health care and dental package for him and his family.”[/quote][/b] Is Pinkerton’s health care package capped at $15,000 by contract, assuring that the mayor actually is correct in saying “same old”?
I haven’t read the contract or the news release, so it’s difficult to conclude that the “the cover-up always is worse than…etc., etc.” But, it seems that the misunderstandings are a logical outcome because city negotiators focus on “gross wages” because applicants only see their pay as the most understated figure that can be divined from all the things that go into compensating an employee.
As the mayor points out, “the purpose of the paragraph was to succinctly set out what we had negotiated.” Including all the dollars we’re paying for Mr. Pinkerton’s services would have “confused” things and, of course, made the paragraph and story less succinct.
Is this correct? Emien didn’t want health insurance because he was covered by the person with whom he lived, wherever that was. So, we gave him $15,000. On the other hand, we’re buying health care for the Pinkerton family. That results in a delta of $15,000 (thereby allowing us to give Pinkerton even MORE, say $14,999, and then claim he’s being paid LESS than Emien was being paid with respect to this part of what we pay).
If we can find a few other such benefits, Pinkerton could be taking in quite a haul. No wonder potential employees only care about gross wages, as long as the city’s negotiators keep shoveling in thousands of dollars worth of compensation that they haven’t been focusing on to avoid “confusing” the cost of hiring Pinkerton.
Are you convinced that the council members knew these “confusing” details (like how much Pinkerton will be costing the city) as they were approving the contract? Does the city staff have no responsibility to make sure they know such things (considering this is secret session stuff, and all)?
Did the council and whoever else was involved in the contract, know whether the new guy should pay 2% or 8%? If so, why wouldn’t the contract reflect the correct contribution? What did Pinkerton think he had negotiated for? It’s a good thing people like Pinkerton don’t care about these little compensation details (since no one else was “focusing” on it) and generously agreed to kick in another 6%, eh?
[quote][i]”The contract is similar in structure to Bill Emlen’s, and its total compensation will, at most, represent a $3,500 increase over Mr. Emlen’s last full year of 2009. That is how Mayor Pro Tem Swanson described it to the Vanguard in a phone conversation following the hire last week.”[/i][/quote]Davis, are you accurately quoting Rochelle here? Sounds as though the major is disputing these facts.
But, it also seems that Rochelle would know that the statement is not accurate because she voted for something other than what you’ve got her saying. Plus, she would have even more access what really happened since she was on the 2×2 negotiating committee that brought the recommendations to the rest of the council, right?
I agree with David’s comments regarding Rifkin’s claim. The difference between lying and just plain being wrong comes down to intent and knowledge. Intentionally presenting information that you know to be false is lying. I don’t think the council’s intent was to deceive. When one thinks about it logically it just doesn’t make sense (however I often find someone’s logic flawed). One does not tell a lie with the intention of being caught in the lie, one tells it making every effort to avoid being caught in the lie. Why would the council attempt to deceive the public with false information knowing that eventually the true information is ultimately going to become public record and expose their lie?
Regarding the correct information on the CMs contract:
Excerpt from previous Vanguard article
“However, Sue Greenwald, who made it clear that Mr. Pinkerton still had her full support, voted against the contract because it was too much money. She argued that the salary was too generous and cited high salaries for local government management positions as a key factor driving local governments toward bankruptcy.
Her colleagues were quick to counter that the most qualified city manager candidates need competitive job offers”
I find a great deal of irony (or better yet hypocrisy) in the city councils’ (sans Sue Greenwald) justification for the new city manager’s compensation. That being the fact that they have acknowledged and applied this philosophy in hiring someone they’ve basically hired to do the exact opposite (i.e. reduce the competitiveness of the total compensation) to the rest of the entire city staff.
Does anyone not see the double-standard here? Those who are suggesting that it may affect the upcoming contract negotiations may not be fare off, and justifiably so.
[i]”Is Pinkerton’s health care package capped at $15,000 by contract, assuring that the mayor actually is correct in saying ‘same old’?”[/i]
No.
Full-time employees represented in Management, PASEA and DPOA, this calendar year, are capped at a cafeteria benefit of $19,769 (equal to $1,647.40 per month). Any amount over that comes out of the employee’s pocket. (There are a handful of current employees whose insurance for themselves, their kids and spouse costs over $20,000.)
Here is how you get to $1,647.40 per month:
$186.98 (full family dental)
$11.40 (life insurance*)
$17.00 (long term disability*)
$1432.02 (health insurance)
Health insurance is set to 3.42% higher than the 2010 Kaiser full family rate due to the cost-sharing provision adopted in the MOUs.
Because DCEA has an imposed contract with no provisions for inflation in their health plans, their monthly max is now slightly lower ($1,600.04).
The firefighters have a higher cafeteria benefit ($1,694.76/month or $20,337/year) than other city employees. However, their max cafeteria cashout is capped at $16,000 per year, while most other employees (not counting those hired in the last 12 months) can take a cashout of up to $18,000 per year if they get their medical coverage from their spouse.
Most full-time city employees get some cafeteria cash-out. In other words, the amount it costs taxpayers for their plans is less than their cap and they get the difference (or 80% of it in the case of fire). However, the changes made in the last round of contracts, for all new hires, will mean that as the labor force turns over, cashing out cafeteria benefits will end.
I have spoken with a couple of current members of the City Council who say they favor treating all current employees the same as we are now treating new hires when it comes to cashouts.
[quote]$11.40 (life insurance*)
$17.00 (long term disability*) [/quote] *These asterisked categories in the cafeteria benefit cannot be cashed out. They are “mandatory.”
I should note that when I checked two years ago how much it costs the taxpayers to fund life insurance and L-T disability for one employee, the total was $7,344.00 per year (or $612/month). I do not know if these costs have inflated much since then.
[i]”I agree with David’s comments regarding Rifkin’s claim. The difference between lying and just plain being wrong comes down to intent and knowledge.”[/i]
You and David are missing the point. Joe’s getting confused between total comp and “gross salary” can be excused as a mistake in terminology, albeit one that made his press release exceedingly wrong. But the $3,500 number is not excusable on the grounds of a mistake. It was clearly designed to deceive. It took one guy’s base salary (Pinkerton) and compared it with another guy’s base salary + his vacation cashout + his management leave cashout + his cafeteria cashout in order to pretend the two were making pretty much the same thing. If you don’t understand that accounting is intentionally deceptive, you don’t understand accounting.
Those who are playing ball and approving the salary jump might happen to find better funding in their future political office endeavors.
Alas Sue Greenwald, by sticking by for the taxpaying schmucks of Davis, you may be hobbling your chances of future political superstar status.
“David, this is completely unfair. “
I don’t know what’s fair and what’s not fair anymore. I do know that I was called unfair by two different councilmembers yesterday. Maybe that means I am fair since I’m pissing both sides off. I have no way of knowing what people do or do not know. That’s why I don’t like the closed door stuff even when it’s appropriate.
Rusty to answer your question, do you think I have let this slide? The former council had a long record of obfuscation that this council does not have. But they have to be more careful in the future.
I don’t agree that this was intentional, I don’t buy Rifkin’s reasoning on that. I have always been very careful about calling people liars, I did say that the staff lied on ZipCars when they were acting as though the verbal agreement was in the written contract. I don’t think that’s what happened here.
Dr. Wu: [i]”Police officers and firefighters can retire early in very generous pensions. I just spoke with two academic researchers (Ph.D’s but not profs) at UCSB and UCSD last week and was appalled by their salaries–in the 70s! Both have dozens of publications in the sciences (not social sciences or humanities) and are recognized as leading researchers in their respective fields. Both have over three decades of experience post-PhD.”[/i]
Of my two sons, one son wanted to teach and now has developed an interest in agricultural science. The other is pursuing a music career. I have talked to both of them about their expectations for pay based on the trends and markets for these two career fields.
I have a real problem with people selecting a career path that is known to be less lucrative than others, and then start complained and demanding legislated fairness. It is a supply and demand issue… apparently the supply of academic researchers with Ph.D’s is strong enough to meet or exceed the demand. Otherwise employers would have to ratchet-up compensation to attract qualified talent.
The firefighters and, to a lesser degree the police, are a different issue… these jobs have distorted total compensation relative to the labor market. The same is true for many other unionized career fields. Talented teachers are another example… they are paid less than the market because unions demand legislated fairness that only differentiates based on seniority.
During the 1990s I worked as the technical services director for a healthcare company. I had 65 employees all with experience and certifications on specific technologies. The dot com tech boom caused the wages expectations for some of these jobs to inflate. For example, in 1998 any senior Oracle Database Administrator in the Sacramento area was making about $125k in salary. About 15% of my employees made significantly more than I did. Then after the dot com crash these wages began to stabilize as a result of a greater supply of labor talent.
It appears that Mr. Pinkerton is a talent in short supply, and his compensation will be commensurate to the market for qualified city managers. The Council should be commended for the hire even as they should respond to the lack of accurate disclosures on his compensation.
If you have looked at our budget, you would know that it is difficult for a city of only 65,000 to afford a total compensation of $281,877 a year. We also have many lower management positions and public safety positions where the total compensation is higher than that of managers of large state agencies.
I don’t think that Jeff Boone is acknowledging the extent to which cities have boot-strapped up the compensation and hence “the market” by paying (other) average and even weak city managers salaries much higher than those of state and federal management.
From discussions I have had with council members over the year, the market is always defined as “what other cities pay”, rather than what we need to pay to get a good employee.
Again, for our generalist management positions I believe that a different type of outreach and recruitment could result, in many cases, in equally good management employees who would cost us much less, but still be making adequate salaries and benefits equal to those of their counterparts in state and federal government.
[quote]”David, this is completely unfair. ”
I don’t know what’s fair and what’s not fair anymore. I do know that I was called unfair by two different councilmembers yesterday—David Greenwald[/quote]Come on David, you know darn well what I was talking about. Just don’t call a pox on all your houses unless it’s warranted.
Your comment was “But even Councilmember Greenwald had failed to note this until a week later.” I explained that I was not part of the negotiating team, saw the contract for the first time during the July 26 closed session, and I reported the error during the first public meeting after the announcement had been made, which was on August 1.
I was the only council member to report the error, and I reported it as soon I found out about it. So don’t pretend to be confused about what is fair and what isn’t. Just acknowledge that, in this particular case, I was part of the solution, not part of the problem.
[i]”I don’t think that Jeff Boone is acknowledging the extent to which cities have boot-strapped up the compensation and hence “the market” by paying (other) average and even weak city managers salaries much higher than those of state and federal management.”[/i]
Sue, I acknowledge that problem. However, do we want Davis to take the lead in correcting it by paying below market rates? The consequences for that will likely be discounted talent. The problem of hiring a quality city manager is somewhat mutually exclusive from the problem of market prices for that specific talent being artificially inflated. It seems to me a problem requiring a “league of cities” approach… not a “Davis go it alone” approach. However, there are some competitive forces at work here too as multiple cities may be competing for a limited talent supply. Great police chiefs and great city managers may very well be worth a premium.
What I would like to see is a lower base salary and some significant percent of compensation – including deferred compensation as retirement benefits – tied to specific performance goals as a performance bonus. The city manager is a chief executive position and most c-suite executives in the private sector have a large perecentage of their total compensation at risk based on their performance relative to committed performance goals. They also carry a compensation upside if they exceed performance goals. I would be fine with that as a tax-payer.
Sue , your main concern today seems to be , Cover my own ass , I was the only one fighting the fight . Throw everybody else under the bus .
Your dialogue on this blog gives no credit to anything that you stand for .
All council members should refrain from using blogs as a way to communicate with the public .
Your representation of the public, who you work for, is very degraded by the ” non-sense ” that is typed here .
[i]”All council members should refrain from using blogs as a way to communicate with the public.”[/i]
Avatar, I completely disagree with this opinion. I am more likely to respect any politician that communicates openly even if I do not agree with their positions on all things. I would be more apt to distrust the non-communicative politician.
You also might want to consider that blogs, tweets, twitters… etc. are the methods used to communicate with younger generations. If we want them engaged with politics – and we do – we need to use their methods.
Sorry, I inadvertently deleted Avatar’s post, which Jeff is responding to. My mistake.
Dr. Wu, I have a problem with your comment on numerous levels.
[quote]City workers are overpaid imho.[/quote]
By just saying city workers and making no differentiation, one would have to assume that you apply this to everyone from a custodian to the city manager. The problem I have with such things as absolutes, stereotypes, or generalized blanket statements is that more often than not at best they’re inaccurate, at worst they’re just plain untrue.
[quote]I just spoke with two academic researchers (Ph.D’s but not profs) at UCSB and UCSD last week and was appalled by their salaries–in the 70s! Both have dozens of publications in the sciences (not social sciences or humanities) and are recognized as leading researchers in their respective fields. Both have over three decades of experience post-PhD.[/quote]
Apples to oranges Dr. Wu, apples to oranges. I wouldn’t base a teacher’s or professor’s or academic researcher’s salary on what a custodian makes, nor would I base a custodian’s salary on what they make. I would base it on the average of what others of the same profession make. Last I checked there were no teacher or professor or academic researcher positions in the City of Davis organization so you can’t use it as a comparison. To imply that the fact those you mentioned are paid so little suggests that city workers are overpaid is arguable. I would simply conclude that it suggests those you have mentioned are underpaid. That being said would the logical solution be to underpay city workers as well? The saying “Two wrongs don’t make a right.” comes to mind. I agree that educators are woefully underpaid, but that in itself is neither here nor there with regards to what city workers are paid.
The only way one could make any sort of accurate statement on this issue would be if they were to take the time to compare the pay of the various city job positions to that of the average pay for the same positions in other public sector (and if applicable private sector) employers. Until you do so, you have no facts or statistics to back up your opinion which wouldn’t be so much humble as it would be uninformed.
[quote]So what is to be done? If we need to pay a higher salary to get someone really good I do think it’s worth it,…[/quote]
So apparently you only apply this philosophy when it comes to the city manager’s position, seeing as how you believe the rest of the city workers are overpaid. So are you suggesting not pay a higher salary to other good employees, or should they not higher good employees, or maybe your suggesting that none of the current city employees are good or are worth it – which is it?
Sequoia,
A reasonable test to see if a job is overpaid is to see how many reasonably qualified applicants you get for an opening. If you get no qulaified applicants or just a small number of marginally qualified applicants, you are probably paying too little. If you get a dozen or more qualified applicants–presuming there is a reasonable method based on education, training, experience, recommendations, etc. to measure “qualified”–you probably are paying too much in total compensation.
Recently, Woodland advertised for 8 open firefighter positions. They stopped letting anyone even apply, once they had (the first day) more than 300 applicants who met the qualifications listed in the job advertisement. In Davis in the past, we have typically had 100 or more applicants for each opening in our fire department.
In my opinion, if we cut the total comp in half for those jobs, we would still get dozens of qualified applicants.
You point out a second way to measure this: how does the job pay compared with the same position in the private sector. Some jobs are not really comparable. But many are.
For example, the typical wage for a private-sector landscape maintenance worker with 5 years or more experience in Davis (I have been told) is $15 per hour. These non-union jobs come with no benefits, no pension and typically no paid vacations, etc.
By contrast, a parks maint. worker 2 for the City of Davis makes $48,000 in salary + $20,000 in medical and dental benefits (most of which he can turn into cash) + $12,480 in pension benefits + life insurance + long-term disability insurance + survivor benefits. To employ this one worker it costs the taxpayers of Davis $88,000, and that does not count the roughly $18,000 for his unfunded retiree health care plan.
Comparing the two, the taxpayers in Davis will pay roughly 2.5 times as much for their lawn mower/hedge trimmer guy as the non-union private employer will pay.
You can make a reasonable argument that the much higher costs to the City reflect a value judgment. But there is no way you can say the City is basing its pay for its parks maintenance workers or secretaries or civil engineers or bookkeepers or office assistants and so on based on an economic argument.
[quote]there is no way you can say the City is basing its pay for its parks maintenance workers or secretaries or civil engineers or bookkeepers or office assistants and so on based on an economic argument. [/quote]interesting… can you cite your sources for this, for all 5 classes?
Rich: [i]”In my opinion, if we cut the total comp in half for those jobs, we would still get dozens of qualified applicants.”[/i]
I completely agree. For a firefighter, many people would love the 3×4 workday weekly schedules and getting paid for sleeping. Which brings me to a point of non-monetary consideration…
Nugget Markets and VSP are two local area companies that have consistently landed on the Fortune 100 best companies to work for. Both companies invest substantial amounts into maintaining an talent-attracting and retaining work culture. They both do heavy marketing on this:
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/VSPQuote.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/NuggetAd.jpg[/img]
Also, both routinely factor geographic cost of living. VSP and Nugget attract and retain top talent without paying a premium. VSP is always inundated with resumes when jobs open even though it is generally known that candidates can make more working for companies like Sutter Health. The same is true for Nugget Markets relative to other grocery stores.
In a study conducted by Frederick Herzberg in 1968 (revalidated in a 2003 Harvard Business Review), Hertzberg uncovered the following factors about employee motivation supporting talent attraction and retention.
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/JobStudy.jpg[/img]
The missed opportunity here is to develop and execute a plan that addresses these factors; leveraging them and the amenities of Davis to attract the best and brightest without having to pay a premium. To do this in Davis will require a very talented and experienced city manager. However, what is interesting about this approach building a work culture that attracts and retains employee talent… it eventually makes the job of management easier, more satisfying and more enjoyable…. thereby attracting and retaining top management talent without needing to pay a premium.
[quote]I completely agree. For a firefighter, many people would love the 3×4 workday weekly schedules and getting paid for sleeping.[/quote]
Wow, what an incredibly harsh, insulting, disrespectful and ungrateful statement. You failed to include saving people’s lives and property, risking their lives going into burning buildings to save others, etc. I’m sure the families of fallen firefighters , and those (and the family of those) who have been saved by firefighters or had their properties saved, not to mention the firefighters themselves, could definitely school you on a few things – especially those who were involved in 9/11.
[quote]Nugget Markets and VSP are two local area companies that have consistently landed on the Fortune 100 best companies to work for. Both companies invest substantial amounts into maintaining an talent-attracting and retaining work culture. They both do heavy marketing on this[/quote]
While I grant that Fortune 100 could probably be considered a reliable gauge, I don’t think cutting and pasting the recruiting ads for these companies gives your comment any more credibility. If one were to look at the recruiting ads for Walmart or Taco Bell the make it sound like it’s the greatest place in the world to work for.
[quote]Also, both routinely factor geographic cost of living. VSP and Nugget attract and retain top talent without paying a premium. VSP is always inundated with resumes when jobs open even though it is generally known that candidates can make more working for companies like Sutter Health. The same is true for Nugget Markets relative to other grocery stores.[/quote]
From what I’ve read I don’t doubt that they are strong in attracting and retaining top talent. However, I have not looked into it specifically to be able to confirm the retaining part other than their high rankings in best places to work for. And the retaining part is the key hear because let’s face it, in today’s job market it’s not exactly difficult to attract talent, it’s keeping the talent that’s important. Having a revolving door with regards to your turnaround results in; lost time, lost money, lost productivity and lost efficiency. And I have not heard any personal testimonials from the actual employees regarding working conditions other than what I’ve read here regarding VSP:
http://www.glassdoor.com/Reviews/Vision-Service-Plan-Reviews-E7270.htm
However I unless you’re referring specifically to salary/wages I find error with “without paying a premium”. With regards to VSP, they have an extremely good benefits package, and as such their approach would be considered similar to the city’s – that being one of lower pay and better benefits. With regards to Nugget I found this article interesting:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2010/snapshots/5.html
But I don’t think “without paying a premium” applies here. Maybe the salary/wages are lower than the other supermarket chains but a checker there makes an average yearly wage of $35,902 and a store director $101,927. Which are ranked 41st and 69th respectively in the respective categories here:
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/bestcompanies/2010/pay/index.html
On top of that they get 100% medical coverage and 401K profit sharing, so again, they are on the higher end when it comes to benefits as well.
With regards to the 1968 Herzberg study, I’m assuming your exerpts are from the 2004 FMI Journal article by Merge Gupta-Sunderji
(http://www.mergespeaks.com/pdfs/FMIRetentionTurnoverEnglish.pdf )which I believe is actually more of a interpretive synopsis of (if I’m not mistaken) Herzberg’s study involving his two-factor theory:
http://gaounion.net/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/196801-02-hbr-herzberg-article-on-motivation.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two-factor_theory
When citing a reference I prefer to include a link so that if someone chooses to they can read the whole thing. Yes, it has been revalidated on more than one occasion but still is not without its criticisms.
I believe that most people who are or have been employees would agree that when evaluating a potential job offer the three of the most important factors would be salary, benefits and opportunity for advancement. And, the two of the most common things they would identify as “recognition for the achievement” would be in the form of raises or promotions. I would ask this question of anyone: If you had a choice between a job with lower pay and good benefits or higher pay and not so good benefits – or a job with lower pay and not so good benefits – which would you choose?
[i]”And I have not heard any personal testimonials from the actual employees regarding working conditions other than what I’ve read here regarding VSP”[/i]
I was a manager there for six years.
My brother is a manager working for Nugget Markets.
[i]”Wow, what an incredibly harsh, insulting, disrespectful and ungrateful statement. You failed to include saving people’s lives and property, risking their lives going into burning buildings to save others, etc.”[/i]
Let me understand… because I did not mention these things I am harsh, or because I said others would like to work their schedule I was harsh? Help me understand why you think what I wrote was harsh.
[quote]
Let me understand… because I did not mention these things I am harsh, or because I said others would like to work their schedule I was harsh? Help me understand why you think what I wrote was harsh.
[/quote] You are harsh because the statement was deliberately and unnecessarily derogatory, not to mention not entirely accurate. It’s not entirely a regular 3 to 4 day a week schedule. We’re not talking 8AM to 5PM here. I believe they are 24 hours-a-day shifts and while they’re not working the entire time they are going out on calls at any give time of the day or night. And they don’t spend their entire time sleeping or even their entire time between calls sleeping. There is in fact some work to be done when they are not on calls.
[quote]
A reasonable test to see if a job is overpaid is to see how many reasonably qualified applicants you get for an opening. If you get no qulaified applicants or just a small number of marginally qualified applicants, you are probably paying too little. If you get a dozen or more qualified applicants–presuming there is a reasonable method based on education, training, experience, recommendations, etc. to measure “qualified”–you probably are paying too much in total compensation. [/quote]
Rikin,
Is this model something that is actually currently being applied by other employers and if so, whom? Or is this simply something of your own design.