To All Delegates and Members

October 2006

Contract News

We concluded our third mediation session at PERB. The following recaps those sessions and the next steps in our efforts to get us a fair contract.

While we approached the mediation seriously, with the hopes of reaching a negotiated agreement, the City did not move off its position that the PBA accept 3%, 3.15% over the first two years of an agreement, consistent with settlements voluntarily agreed to by other police unions. The City was willing to discuss the possibility of a four year agreement, but did not offer a specific percentage increase for years 3 and 4.

For our part, we did not reject outright the concept of a four-year deal. However, we laid out two interests that we needed to be addressed in order to consider a four-year deal:

  1. A 4-year deal must move us substantially toward a market rate of pay. When asked about a wage increase, we emphasized specifically the Port Authority compensation scale; and

  2. We also wanted acknowledged the special characteristics of our job, including the training and the tremendous productivity this agency realized through our members working with thousands of fewer police officers. For this component, we suggested special, additional terrorism pay, education pay, and defibrillator pay.

Not surprisingly in light of past practices, the City was unwilling to offer any alternatives to get us to a market rate. They insisted that a deal be pattern conforming and made no effort to address our competitive pay issues.

As a result, the PERB mediator has concluded that nothing further can be accomplished in mediation. The mediator will communicate his conclusion to PERB.

Therefore, it appears we are on our way to the PBA’s fifth arbitration in six rounds. While we have said repeatedly that the best way to get a contract is at the table, we will not voluntarily agree to a deal that will put us further behind our counterparts in other, local police jurisdictions.

The PERB arbitration process will play out over future months. We will keep you updated as we go through that process.

Fraternally,

Patrick J. Lynch
President