City of Davis

As Councilmember Heystek said following the approval of the firefighter contract in December,

The Sacramento Bee called this the rude side of small town democracy.  They wrote this morning that Davis, in comparison to the civil discussion in Winters over a fast-food restaurant:

The city was clearly aware of this potential conflict of interests.  The Vanguard understands that City Finance Director Paul Navazio recused himself from being the city bargaining team when the department heads discussion came up due to the fact that he deemed it to be a potential conflict of interest.

From the standpoint of fairness, I certainly could not support a system where fire and management got a better deal than the 125 or so employees that make up the PASEA bargaining group.

I delayed writing about this for a day. I wanted to gain some reflection. I wanted to see how things played out.  I spoke to other reporters about the propriety of reporting such a personal encounter and asked what they would do.  But mostly I watched the response of the community and whether Councilmember Sue Greenwald would step up and take responsibility for her actions on Tuesday.

The second time the Mayor retreated into the vestibule where she began getting medical attention from an off-duty firefighter.  She would later be taken to the hospital.  The Vanguard understands that her blood pressure rose greatly but has no further details on her condition at this time.

This was the first public announcement by City Staff of the scope of the long anticipated water rate increases needed to finance the proposed new water project yet they provided only a meager 2-paragraph report to the NRC in asking for their approval to Council.

Said Councilmember Greenwald last Tuesday:

It is more of the same for the city, grandiose claims of savings, this time, of 2.19 million dollars over the projected baseline contract.  The contract savings mainly comes from the continuation of seven furlough days between December 2009 and June of 2010, five in 2010-11, and two in 2011-12.  In addition, there are a few structural changes, mainly along the lines of the management group contract that caps the cafeteria plan cash-out for employees, creates a vesting period for retiree medical benefits, and a cost-sharing plan on PERS rate cost increases.

The new contracts only partially address this issue.  The fire contract proposes a 20% of reduction of the cash payment maximum over the three year MOU.  The management group contract proposes no changes for existing employees but a $500 maximum payment for new employees.

According to the staff report, the tax currently generates $2.9 million in annual revenues, which represents around 8% of the City’s overall General Fund Revenues.

It is also unfortunate that Mr. Souza’s comments on Tuesday night demonstrated a lack of understanding about the amount of savings the city is really deriving from the MOUs.  While Mr. Souza messed up the math which was rather humorous given his choice of words, the larger point is more serious.

The discussion on Tuesday, was particularly enlightening, as the Council Majority essentially made three points, first they argued that this contract represents a savings of $744,000.  Second, they argued that while not as much as they might have liked, this contract marks the first time that the council has decreased the size of contracts.  Finally, they argue that this contract begins to deal with the structural issues.