Ever since the Davis Enterprise ran the story on employee salaries that reported that there were 72 employees receiving over $100,000 in salary and overtime in 2008 and that 38 of those were firefighters, it has been very interesting to read the letters to the editor in the Davis Enterprise.
The latest such letter was yesterday from Dennis Westcot.
“On April 8, The Davis Enterprise listed city employees who earned over $100,000 in 2008. I was astonished to see that 38 of the 72 listed (53 percent) were firefighters, while at the same time the fire chief is saying the department needs more money to match surrounding cities. Davis does not have the same risk as Sacramento and West Sacramento where there are high-rises and many industrial areas.”
Mr. Westcot continues:
“I read in the Sacramento Bee the next day that the average firefighter in Sacramento made $70,353 with overtime and that fire captains with overtime earned an average of just about $100,000. Do we have 38 fire captains in Davis?”
Very interesting. Having read these letters, it has become very clear as it did last August when we ran much the same story for the first time, that the public just has no idea how much we are paying city employees, much less firefighters.
The firefighters have always gotten away from it because most people, including myself, believe that firefighting is a noble profession. I grew up respecting firefighters. During 9/11, like most people firefighters were near and dear to my heart. I marveled at their bravery and heroism. What many do not realize is that firefighters to some extent used that gratitude and respect to earn larger and larger salaries.
So here is Mr. Westcot eloquently laying it all on the line:
“While I have respect for firefighters, this seems to be out of control. Their job is no more risky than a police officer and I did not see 38 police officers on that list. They also do not perform any more important a job than a school teacher and I would be willing to bet you will not find 53 percent of the Davis school teachers making over $100,000.”
Mr. Westcot is not alone here, nor is it the first such letter. His however perhaps expresses the best that I have seen.
What he does not know is that in fact, while there are 38 firefighters on the list there are just 11 police officers. In fact the average firefighter with overtime makes over $105,000 per year, the average police officer makes considerably less, more like $72,000. Even when you look only at sworn police versus actual firefighters it is $108,000 to about $78,000. In total compensation the comparison is $142,000 for fire and $103,000 for police.
Teachers make even less than that.
So Mr. Westcott is exactly right. The firefighters in part have gotten away with this not just because they have poured huge amounts of money into council races, more than all of the employee bargaining groups combined. But I also believe they have gotten away with this because the average person in this community had no idea how much they are getting paid.
It is for that reason, that the article that the Davis Enterprise ran on employee salaries was so vital and the Enterprise had followed the Vanguard’s lead on this issue from about six months prior. For the first time, people are learning the truth about what we are paying.
The timing could not be better because the city as we know is in the process of negotiating new contracts with of the bargaining groups. In fact, they had a long session just on Wednesday.
It is the view of the Vanguard that we are going to have to do something to cap and hold the line of salaries, pensions, and benefits if we want to get our budget in order not just to deal with the immediate multi-year multi-million dollar budget deficit, but to deal with the longer term structural problems.
Along those lines it was gratifying to see former Davis City Councilmember Stan Forbes’ letter to the editor on Sunday. Mr. Forbes was on the council that adopted the current four-firefighters policy that has also come under of late.
Writes the former councilmember:
“I served on the City Council that adopted the four-firefighters-per-station policy currently under review. At that time in the late 1990s, the city had the money to fund the policy and the firefighters’ salaries and benefits weren’t so expensive, so adding a fourth firefighter to each of two stations made sense.
However, even then there was some question as to the cost-effectiveness of doing so, since most fire calls do not involve fires in which two firefighters enter a structure, but instead are medical calls that do not require four responders. Given what firefighters are paid today, and the state of the city’s finances, I think it unlikely the decision would be repeated today.”
He raises an important point that the staffing issue was not nearly as problematic when they originally made the decision to expand to a fourth firefighter.
As we explained last week, the policy put forth by OSHA was never intended to be a staffing policy. Instead it was a safety policy. They suggested numerous alternative approaches including an initial stance of fighting the fire outside until the second unit arrives. There are additional possibilities that we might want to consider such as training police officers to be initial responders to enable fire fighters to go in more immediately.
As the Vanguard has learned, most fire departments do not use exclusively four men engine teams. That means that other cities have dealt with this issue and learned how to operate in an effective manner.
The statistics of course show that most calls do not involve fires, just as Mr. Forbes points out. In fact, only 35 last year involved a structure fire that might have required entry. I agree with the notion of planning for emergencies and having contingencies for worst case scenario. But what those contingencies are should be questioned and developed.
As was suggested last week, having an outside advisor look into the situation to assess our needs would not be the worst idea given our costs.
What is becoming increasingly clear is that as the public becomes aware of the actual budget situation and salary structure, fire is not going to be able to count on blanket support for them. We all respect and appreciate the work that they do, however, we believe the city can be just as well served by a more fiscally responsible salary and staffing structure. It would be nice if the fire department would work with us rather than against us on this goal.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
Good article David. Mr. Westcot and Stan Forbes make good points too.
It’s interesting to see the real numbers compared to Sacramento firefighters who get paid less money and have more fires and dangerous situations to deal with than Davis.
I hope that Fire Chief Conroy and the firefighters union is reasonable and understand that we respect the work they do, but the big salaries and benefits are just not sustainable.
DPD, excellent article. However, if citizens do not stand up in force, and voice their objections in a way that makes it clear there will be dire consequences for the City Council majority, Bill Emlen et al will not bargain in good faith in the best interests of the city with respect to the city employee contracts. Why? Because firefighters heavily contributed to the campaigns of Saylor and Souza, who are part of the ASS (Asmundson, Saylor, Souza) City Council majority, and Bill Emlen takes his marching orders from the City Council majority to keep his cushy job. It (firefighters, City Council majority, City Manager and staff) is an unholy alliance that is going to bankrupt this city.
Someone needs to look into the Parks and Rec Dept. Recently they split the department in two, supposedly to save money, but I wonder if it didn’t create more jobs than save funding.
Asking to undo firefighter’s bloated salaries is going to be difficult- they have bought a few councilmen fair and square and aren’t going to give up their purchases easily.
So we now have a crew of four fireman, with two of these being captains (38 of 72) at an average of $100K a year [u]each [/u]heroically responding to what? We don’t really have traditional structure fires in Davis… The few we have do not really involve brave firemen entering burning buildings and carrying out grateful children. No, what they are doing is dealing with medical issues which in most towns would have been dealt with by a private ambulance service- the costs of which are paid for by the people who need the service.
So we have these four inappropriately dressed, highly paid and trained firemen, in full turn-outs, face masks, helmets, big boots etc. arrive to deal with a skinned knee from a bike accident. Woohoo!!!
Time to end this charade and turn Davis into a Volunteer Fire Department with highly trained volunteers (they are out there and would be happy to participate).
Who has determined the negotiating team and what is the process for CC oversight?
To me the present team is highly conflicted, don’t they stand to gain either $ themselves or indirectly since they work with these folks.
Do they report to CC at end or during process?
SOADA’ite you make strong points. Yes, there is a conflict. The negotiating team is the city manager and the finance director both who play up to the three members of the council majority A.S.S. (Asmundson, Saylor, Souza) because they secure his job.
I do not know who else is on the team do you David?
It would greatly benefit the tax payers of Davis to have an independent, – not connected to fire fighters, city manager, city council – negotiator to do the negotiating for these lucrative contracts that need to be scaled back. Mr. Westcot pointed out Sacramento ff salaries and it’s alarming that they are so much less than Davis and they serve a much larger area.
We need to tell the city manager to stop the gravy train.
The more profound consideration is the cost of retiree benefits. This is the real gravy train we should be concerned about. Public safety employees generally retire at 55 years of age with 70-90% pay, and full medical for life. If they die before their spouse, she continues to get a percentage of this (I don’t remember what the percentage is).
To understand the true costs of these employees, we should take the average life expectancy (say 87), figure the total life-cost, and annualize it. I bet we are looking at a good number of $200k employees with this math.
All of this would be reasonable if it was the standard for other professional employees. Consider a typical professional employee with a 4 or 6-year college degree working for a private company. Today, that person would likely be paying for some or all of his/her healthcare costs would have only a 401k (no pension) that is only partially funded by the employer, and would have no job security. This person is probably planning to work until he/she is 75 if lucky enough to find and retain work. So, even with base pay commensurate with a $100k-plus firefighter, the comparison becomes significantly different calculating full benefits for life.
Houston, we have a problem.
I’ve been doing my errands in Davis this week and have stopped into many businesses .
#1. Starbucks coffee , 4 employees working the front counter
#2. Wells Fargo bank , 8 employees visible
#3. Dos Coyotes for lunch , 7 employees visible
#4. Mortgage lender office , 5 employees visible
#5. Safeway , way too many to count
#6. My dentest , 6 visible employees
#7. My pharmacy , 5 visible employees
#8. Petco , 4 visible employees
Say what your saying is that when you are dying from a medical emergency ,trapped in a car after a wreck , or your most coveted house is on fire you only want three (3) people responding to your ( 911 ) emergency .
Reposting my comment from yesterday:
You nailed it! The City has been put on notice and the community should hold every Councilmember responsible to make sure that new affordable labor contracts are put in place. The City’s labor negotiators are currently in “negotiations” with all city employee labor groups. The City Council must insist that City Manager Bill Emlen, Assistant City Manager Paul Navazio, Human Resources Administrator Melissa Chaney and City Attorney Harriet Steiner who make up the negotiating team representing the City close the budget gap caused by previous MOU contracts with the employee bargaining units, including their own. The problem is that these very same people have all mightily contributed to the city’s current and long-term fiscal instability because they “gave away the store” in previous labor negotiations. They agreed to salaries, benefits and retirements that the City could not afford. None of the current MOU contracts were affordable (especially the lavish upper management and fire fighter contracts) or sustainable, yet Emlen & Co. did it anyway and previous city councils that included Ruth Asmundson and Don Saylor approved them. We will watch what they do over the next few weeks and see if our city leaders will provide the LEADERSHIP necessary to change past behavior or will they just do as they have always done—increasingly put the City in financial peril.
David, thank you for your willingness to confront the “pink elephant” in the room.
“”””””””The firefighters have always gotten away from it because most people, including myself, believe that firefighting is a noble profession. I grew up respecting firefighters. During 9/11, like most people firefighters were near and dear to my heart. I marveled at their bravery and heroism. What many do not realize is that firefighters to some extent used that gratitude and respect to earn larger and larger salaries.”””””””””
David Greenwald , this statement by you, speaks volumes about your shallow and sub standard thinking . Saying that Firefighters used this tragic event to receive more pay, is as low and shameful as a struggling blog can sink to boost readership , shame on YOU .
You truly don’t walk in the shoes of those you berate , before you type on your keyboard of venom .
Instead of refuting the point, “Shame on…” simply calls names. My understanding is that Greenwald’s point is empirically supportable. But then again, it is easier to throw vitriol. Your comments are ironic since you consistently do the same things that you accuse Greenwald of doing.
“””””””The statistics of course show that most calls do not involve fires, just as Mr. Forbes points out. In fact, only 35 last year involved a structure fire that might have required entry. I agree with the notion of planning for emergencies and having contingencies for worst case scenario. But what those contingencies are should be questioned and developed.”””””””
So because only 35 people have 35 houses catch on fire , your sub standard thinking must be that we need more people and houses to suffer and catch on fire , yes this is really progressive thinking by you David . Let it be known that David Greenwald , Sue Greenwald’s son I believe , wants more loss ,pain ,sadness ,and probably death in the City of Davis .
Fire Statistics from 2007.
There were 3,430 civilians that lost their lives as the result of fire.
There were 17,675 civilian injuries that occurred as the result of fire.
There were 118 firefighters killed while on duty.
Fire killed more Americans than all natural disasters combined.
84 percent of all civilian fire deaths occurred in residences.
There were an estimated 1.6 million fires in 2007.
Direct property loss due to fires was estimated at $14.6 billion.
An estimated 32,500 intentionally set structure fires resulted in 295 civilian deaths.
Intentionally set structure fires resulted in an estimated $733 million in property damage.
Davis is mostly residences, right?
AAAAAHaaaaaaa: You all don’t get it, do you?? The gravy train just needs to be sustainable so long as THEY ARE ON IT! Do you think any of them give a rats ass what happens to the pay&benefits after they’ve retired?? They’ve got theirs and that’s all that matters…..I don’t see anything in print to change my mind regarding their penchant for “more money, all the time and we don’t care that you don’t have it”
Is there a specific reason why all the negotiations with the employee bargaining groups can’t be recorded?? How difficult could that be?? No one else needs to be present…just set it up, when the people are chatting it records….pretty tough concept. Let’s see who exactly “puts up or shuts up” when the chips are down! Will Saylor-Man studder and stammer(and end up saying nothing after 10-15 minutes!!) when its time to really care OUR water??
Salaries are way too bloated and need to reflect accurately the dwindling budget. Or we can just continue to hand over our money to these guys when really in truth, there’s no need for alot of these fire engines and such. They truly are just sitting there day after day after day, waiting for a catastrophe. It’s a kitch job. I want to get paid 100k to sit around and wait for a fire.
ps.
To the “just some facts from FEMA” comment.
Do you remember the story about several firefighters who set fires for job security? Citizens of Davis, be forwarned. Looks like we’re gonna see some fires real soon. There are jobs to be justified.
FYI:
Fire and police officers can retire at age 50; not 55. All of our other workers can retire at age 55.
Stating salaries always underestimates the problem, since our benefits are extraordinarily high compared to other public agencies such as the university, state, school district and federal government, and this cost to the city does not show up in salary figures.
I can’t believe you would even write such a thing. You are a horrible person for suggesting that a Davis Firefighter would purposly light a fire. What abuse did you suffer as a child to believe a professional firefighter would purposly harm the people they are sworn to serve to get a better contract. Here is a link to a report on firefighter arson. More crazy facts.
http://www.usfa.fema.gov/downloads/pdf/publications/tr-141.pdf
You might read the report and learn that nearly all of the firefighters responsible for arson were volunteer or seasonal part time. I feel sorry for you.
Get real folks. We vote for the guys in the glossy flyers purchased by the fireboys and policegirls. As was said above, our city council members were purchased fair and square. A democracy gets the government it deserves.
No wonder the lines are around the block and people line up 3 days beforehand when there is any testing for firefighter! I respect firefighters and the job they do but I must admit they are definately overpaid in Davis.