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Wage dispute system may need reform

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Wednesday, Jul 23, 2008 - 12:13:20 am CDT

Lincoln City Hall already is wrestling with budget problems. The money trouble could get even worse now that an employee union has decided to take its wage dispute to the state.

Heading to the Commission of Industrial Relations is the Public Association of Government Employees, which represents 456 blue-collar, clerical and technical employees.

The last time this happened in 1998, city government ended up on the hook for $4.7 million in back pay for firefighters.

That prompted an unsuccessful attempt by Lincoln city officials and others to reform the CIR system to give elected officials more control over employee wages.

Renewal of that effort would be timely. Local elected officials should consider joining forces with officials elsewhere in the state to convince the Legislature to look into the possibility of reform.

The CIR system, created in 1947 and broadened in 1969 to include all public employees, has not undergone substantive change for several decades.

The chief impetus for its creation was a desire by elected officials to avoid the specter of strikes by public employees. The commission provides a safety valve by allowing public employees to seek wages that are comparable to employees in similar jobs.

Few elected officials would want to eliminate the commission. Strikes by public employees are enormously disruptive. Negative effects can linger for years.

However, improvement in the system may be possible by setting new guidelines for the CIR to use when it selects an array of cities and employee groups that it considers comparable to the workers seeking the ruling.

Local officials have long contended that the CIR has too much latitude in determining that array. In the 1998 ruling on firefighters, for example, the commission included the city of Minneapolis, which was part of a metropolitan area with a population more than four times that of Lincoln.

Another change suggested by advocates would be greater reliance by the CIR on comparisons with the private sector.

Certainly city employees should be paid a fair wage. The city work force is shouldering an ever-increasing workload. Except for public safety workers, the number of city employees has been declining in recent years.

Mayor Chris Beutler’s proposed budget would put the number of non-public safety workers below the total in 1990. Since then, the city has grown by almost 30,000 residents.

But the system also ought to be fair to taxpayers. Changes in the CIR system would give local officials more control over personnel costs and could provide more flexibility to adapt to rapidly evolving changes in the marketplace.


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How long has it been wrote on July 23, 2008 7:53 am:
" I see a definite side in this editiorial and it is for management. How long has it been sing the legislature, the Supreme Court, or similar state agencies have "undergone substantive change"? How many times have any of the groups that have appeared before the Commission have gone on strike? If any, there haven't been many. I think that was a statement meant to inflame the discussion.

I don't think people who support changes in the Commission really want the jobs compared to the private job world. Some jobs really don't compare because they are unique to government. Part of the duties might be similar, but that isn't the same thing. Who are we going to compare them to -- the LIBA jobs?? "

 Alan wrote on July 23, 2008 12:17 pm:
" The taxpayers get hit over the head by this over and over. I'm all for a fair wage for city workers but let's be real. Lincoln isn't in the league of the compare cities.

What if we had a law that demanded tax equity? No tax levied in Nebraska could be higher than a similar tax levied in the surrounding states. "

 biases biases wrote on July 23, 2008 1:41 pm:
" I see a definete side in this editorial and it is for labor. The language talks about fewer civil employes now, but an increased population. Beyond this implication that city employees are working harder, and doing more with less people, overt language in the editorial says "The city workforce is shouldering an ever increasing workload."

But are they getting paid less? Or the same? Or have the salaries gone up. Don't forget the technology of the last 18 years (used in the example) that makes it easier to do more work with less people. Software, computers, advances in automation, etc. all eliminate jobs at the public trough and empower fewer people to be more productive.

Simply talking about the change in the number of jobs in a couple decades is not really intellectually honest when the discussion is about the level of pay and the service provided to the taxpayer, whether or not there are 30,000 more (or less) of them. "

 dc wrote on July 23, 2008 3:16 pm:
" Reform should begin within Lincoln city Government, And How it manages our property tax, and budgetary issues. Poor Fiscal responsibility in Lincoln city government has ultimately led to Wage Disputes. If as a Private sector Business owner I Conducted my budget in the way the city has , my business would not have lasted very long. Only in government when you run out of money can you ask for more from the public. CIR is one way of checks and balances for both city employee's and city government. "

 Wheres mine wrote on July 23, 2008 4:33 pm:
" I've been working the same job for a little over 4yrs now and have not received a raise. I'm not complaining though because my company works with contractors. If a contractor makes enough profit then my company may see pay raises within the contract, but with failing economy we must underbid the competitors to the point of being near minimum wage with no raises in sight. Some of the companies we work for are employed by the city and state. It's mind bottling that city and state workers keep asking for pay raises from taxpayers when blue collar workers are barely scraping by with monthly bills. People can argue all day who works harder than who, but in the end were all doing a JOB that we all chose. The economy is down and more citizens are leaving Lincoln to find higher paying jobs. If our elected officials can find a way to stop this, or heck, even slow it down, I'd gladly say yes to a raise for city officials. Yet, if your asking for one right now then I have to ask, where's mine? "

 Tom Casady wrote on July 23, 2008 5:33 pm:
" Check your math. The population of Lincoln has grown by about 60,000 since 1990--not 30,000 as this editorial indicates. The 1990 census pegged Lincoln at 191,972. As the Journal Star just reported on July 10 of this year, the Census Bureau estimated Lincoln's population as of July 1, 2007 at 248,744. That estimate is over a year old now, and as the same article points out, Lincoln is growing at a pace in excess of 3,000 per year. Thus, our current population is in all likelihood pushing 252,000. "

 Too Bad wrote on July 23, 2008 6:37 pm:
" Sorry Tom. My math isn't that great. Although, I can read and I see you're name in the paper a lot. I can obviously see you're reasons for defending the city employee's getting a raise when you yourself are a cop. If you wanted a better paying job maybe you're math should have been better too. "

 Thats why they should negotiate wrote on July 24, 2008 12:24 am:
" I don't think the CIR should make any major changes in the way it operates. It seems to me that city and other governmental officials just want to have more control over their "opposition" when things aren't going in the favor of the government officials.

How do you plan to compare some jobs that are unique to the government system? Is it going to be by job duties or by job classification?

I don't think job duties should be ignored, but I see that happening at my job at a governmental entity. Most of my job duties are exclusive to a government position. How is someone going to compare my job to a private industry?

Is the array going to have small business jobs with limited salaray or is the array going to have businesses that are similar in size to the group to be evaluated? I certainly don't want my job compared to an associate at a two person business.

By the way, my calculator shows that Lincoln's population has increased from approximately 192,000 people in 1990 to 249,000 (approximate) in 2007. "

 Tom Casady wrote on July 24, 2008 11:09 am:
" Too Bad: I'm not defending anyone, I'm just pointing out that the City of Lincoln has grown 60,000 since 1990, not "almost 30,000." Personally, I agree with the editorial. "

 ted wrote on July 25, 2008 8:56 am:
" I work at the university, where many staff employees earn less than City employees who do the same type of work; and much less than LPS workers.Local property taxes pay for LPS, state taxes and tuition pay for UNL workers. If city workers don't like their jobs they can always quit. "

 help ted out wrote on July 25, 2008 11:19 pm:
" Nobody said city employee's were unhappy with their jobs. They are simply asking for a fair wage. If Ted makes less, maybe he needs to stand up and ask for more, whether through a union or from the university. I wish my kids can go to UNL for what university employee families do, that is a earned incentive through employement, just like city employee's benefits. Ted what if the university told you or your co-workers that they can no longer allow employee's or their families attend the university at a reduced cost, that you have to pay full tuition like evryone else becuase they just can't afford that anymore?.City employee's have been in similar situations with their benefits in the past. "

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