[donotprint]View a printer friendly version of this post here.[/donotprint]
In late June, the new MOU for 2010 through 2012 will go into effect. Stewards and staff members from the Local 2960 have been busy answering as many questions and concerns as possible from the members in all of our departments. However, we discovered that many of you are asking the same things. We wanted to make an effort to answer as many of those frequently asked questions as possible and made the information accessible to everyone involved. If you still have unanswered questions, feel free to ask away at the bottom of the post. (Questions will be moderated and sent to the most appropriate staff member or steward for an answer.)
Q: What date does the new contract go into effect?
A: July 1st, 2010.
Q: I have vacation time scheduled before the new MOU goes into effect. Can I use furlough days for this vacation, or do I have to wait until the new goes into effect.
A: The 48 hours (6 days) of mandatory furlough time will not take effect until the start of the fiscal year for 2010. This means that furlough time taken prior to this date will not “count” toward the goal of 48 hours per fiscal year. However, city managers have extended the “voluntary furlough program” through the remainder of this budget year, which means that the opportunity may be there. Consult with your management staff if you would like to pursue this option.
Q: Can I use my furlough hours in partial days instead of full shifts?
A: This depends largely on the area in which you work. The city AR policy states that furloughs must be taken in a minimum of 4 hour increments without prior approval from your department head. However, there are department heads who have already given their consent to accommodating furloughs of less than four hour intervals. Our advice is to involve the union stewards in conversations with the managers in your area as early in the process as possible. We are all looking for solutions that will minimize the impact of the furlough time on our employees. If it works for your managers and it works for you… it works for us.
Q: Will people be allowed to carry over more than the maximum vacation time or for the next two years? What will happen in 2012 when our vacation banks have an extended amount of time in them? Will the vacation buyout for people retiring in the next two years be allowed to exceed the current 450 hour maximum?
A: Because we conceded our ability to buy back our vacation time for the next two years, the current cap of vacation time hours has been extended through the duration of the 2010-2012 MOU. When this benefit is restored in 2012, the existing vacation buy back rules should resume.
For those lucky enough to be retiring within this two year period of time, the City of Phoenix will still pay you for your accumulated vacation hours up to the current cap of 450 total hours.
Q: When is the last vacation buyback period, and what are the requirements for me to sell my vacation back to the City?
A: The last opportunity to cash in your vacation time will occur in the last pay period in May. In order to cash out vacation time, you must have already used at least 40 hours of either comp time or vacation. A maximum of 40 hours of vacation may be sold back to the city.
[donotprint]Note: Prior to March 15th, this answer stated that employees could sell back up to 80 hours of vacation time in May. The benefit has a maximum of 80 hours of vacation time over the course of a year, but the rule of 40 hours at a time is still in effect from our existing MOU. Our apologies for any confusion that this may have caused.[/donotprint]
Q: Will the accumulation of comp time hours be effected by our new contract?
A: No. The only foreseeable effect on your comp time banks will be the inability to sell off accumulated comp time annually. The buy back period for this benefit was in December which falls after the start of our fiscal year. (The vacation buy back periods and comp time buy back periods are different.) Comp time accumulated in excess of the 200 hour maximum will automatically be converted into cash, just like it always has been. And, of course, you may still use comp time hours as paid vacation hours just like before.
Q: Other units were able to negotiate for significantly less than 48 hours in furlough time. How did that work?
A: The other units in question were able to concede other benefits that equaled out to 3.2% of their total benefits and wages owed to them by the city. Other units, for example, were able to give back higher amounts of their deferred compensation or a higher percentage of their wages to make up the difference.
Q: Could we have given back our tuition reimbursement funding instead?
A: We tried. City personnel were not willing to negotiate this point with any of the bargaining units, feeling that an educated workforce would be worth more to the citizens of Phoenix in the long run. It wouldn’t have made that big of a difference anyway; it was only worth approximately $800,000.
Q: What about funding for uniform allowances?
A: Again, we tried. The issue at hand was that uniform allowances did not amount to a dollar savings that made it worth our while to consider the option. There are not a lot of employees in the Local 2960 who receive this benefit to begin with. These employees would likely have still been required to wear job-specific attire to work every day. This would have been an additional out of pocket expense in an already strained paycheck.
Q: Why was there only one option presented to us for ratification? Other units seemed to have more flexibility in choosing the options that worked for them.
A: Of the seven collective bargaining units that negotiated with the City of Phoenix officials, exactly one had a ballot that allowed its members to pick and choose from a set of concession options.To the leadership within the Local 2960, the fact that they needed to do this suggests that they had not been in touch with their constituents prior to the barganing process this year.
Before any member of the Local 2960 began to speak with city personnel, we surveyed our members for their opinions of which issues were most important to them. The survey results allowed us to go into the negotiation with a specific direction in mind. Your feedback to us told us that wages and longevity pay ranked among the highest priority and we sought to protect as much of those benefits as possible during our negotiations. Negotiating for protections in longevity pay could not take place fairly without negotiation for merit increases as well. (We didn’t wish to unfairly protect our senior employees and expose our junior members who are still subject to merit increases.) Knowing that we needed to protect these three things, we constructed our concession package to the city accordingly.
Turnout for our surveys was only about 10% of the total overall membership of the Union. So if you feel under represented, and you did not return a survey this year, you have only yourselves to blame. We will be looking into ways to make sure that your opinions can be heard more clearly when we enter negotiations for 2012, including the possibility of submitting your survey online in addition to by mail or in person.
Q: What was the concession package worth in dollar amounts?
A: First, we would like to stress that, unlike some of the other bargaining units, we did not blindly give back money to the city. Every dollar conceded was accompanied by a specific goal in mind. “Want us to take a pay cut? Fine, save this department from being eliminated.”
Overall, the negotiated package conceded 3.2% of the total overall expenditure of the city on Unit III employees back to the general fund in order to balance the city budget for the next two years. These concessions were necessary in order to save approximately 170 jobs that would have otherwise been eliminated to make ends meet.
In actual dollar amounts, the package was close to $6 million. The 1% wage reduction was worth about $1.5 million. The majority of the money conceded came from the 48 hours of furlough time, which was worth $3.5 million dollars. Vacation buyback, linguistic pay and the .01% deferred compensation cut made up the $1 million dollar difference.
The current budget situation brought forth an unprecedented necessity to concede our hard earned dollars and benefits; in the history of the Local 2960, we have never taken this deep of a cut in wages or benefits. We hope never to have to do this again.
Q: Did we gain anything at all in these negotiations?
A: Absolutely. 170 people will still be receiving a paycheck tomorrow. Many of these people had received notices from the City informing them that their positions had been eliminated prior to our negotiations. They then came back to work with notices in hand saying that they no longer needed to worry about the loss of income or benefits.
The groups of employees that were directly effected by the efforts of or negotiation team will be featured on this web site as soon as possible. They include a group of full time and part time employees who supply 6,000 meals per day to city residents. 75% of an entire department of fire inspectors were spared the chopping block. Employees of numerous libraries and community centers still have jobs thanks to negotiations done at the Local 2960′s table.
Q: That’s great for them, but my job was never in danger. How do I personally benefit from the concessions?
A: Still not convinced, huh? What about the possibility of working a half a day every other Friday for the next two years?
Time away from work is as much of a benefit as a uniform allowance or a merit increase. Instead of taking a larger cut in your wages, you now have the option to just relax for a few extra hours a month. Furlough time may represent the loss of income to some, but it can also mean more time at home with loved ones. You can also choose to carry forward the savings by scheduling time off in the mornings instead of taking your little ones to day care. Ever want to make your son or daughters tee ball games more frequently? How about doing a little more volunteer work? All of this is possible with the necessity of taking off furlough hours to save the city money. We encourage you to make this work in your favor!
Q: Taking furlough time will effect the gross amount of money I am earning for this year, and will effect the amount of money that I have available for my retirement. Is it possible to write a check back to the general fund instead of taking furlough time?
A: Yes, it will be possible to do this. However, the amount that you will need to give back to the general fund includes the daily cost of your health and insurance benefits as well as your hourly salary. We estimate that this should be about 120% to 125% of your hourly rate. If this is an option you would like to pursue, contact the union hall for the procedure.
Q: We are taking a 1% reduction in our wages for the next two fiscal years. How will this be calculated?
A: You should see a 1% reduction in your wage rate for what ever step you are in in your current pay plan. Keep in mind, however, that merit increases based on your years of service are still in tact, as well as the longevity pay that you accumulate if you are already at the top of your pay scale.
Q: What is a “sunset clause” and why is it important?
A: The “sunset” clause is a statement in our MOU that guarantees that the concessions that we have made this year will be restored in two fiscal years when we negotiate our 2012-2014 contract. This means that at a bare minimum, our benefits will be restored to our current levels by July of 2012.
When the time comes in two years, we expect to gain much more than we lost in this round of negotiations. Our ability to do this will depend on your continued support and feedback. We will continue to negotiate diligently to ensure that our union brothers and sisters get the wages and benefits that we so rightly deserve.
Related posts:
If I’m reading this right, we can cash out 80 hours of vacation in May, even though the current MOU says we can only cash out 40? Plus, if we’re retiring soon, our vacation buyout can exceed the current maximum amounts? That’s great news if it’s true.
Do you know when the new MOU is scheduled to be published?
Frank »
Your eyes do not deceive you. However, the initial draft of this FAQ contained inaccurate information. We will still have to follow the 40 hour maximum during our last opportunity to sell back our vacation hours to the city. You also pointed out that the maximum comp time hours you may carry in the comp time bank is 200, not 120.
Both of these errors have been fixed in the above document.
My personal apologies for the confusion.
Any idea when the MOU will be done? I really need to know if it’s true that I’ll be able to cash out MORE than 450 hours of vacation time when I retire in November, so I know how much vacation time I have to use.
In late April, the city will publish a new
furlough policy to implement the negotiated
agreements.
What does the above sentence mean? and what
new furlough policy, I thought that the 48 hrs.
were already established.
thx
Yoli,
The phrase “late April” does not appear in the FAQ document at all. I’m not sure what you are referring to?
As stated above, the 48 hours (6 days) of mandatory furlough time will not take effect until the start of the fiscal year for 2010.
I also saw a statement from the City Managers office that a furlough policy is being drafted. This worries me that we won’t be able to divide the furlough hours to meet our financial/budget needs and will probably be told they must be taken in whole day increments. If this happens it will be very difficult on this units employees.
Are we required to take 6 furlough days PER fiscal year or is it a total of 6 furlough days over the next two years?
Ann Marie,
The requirement is 48 hours (six 8-hour days) of furlough time per fiscal year.
Thanks for your question!
Just so I understand what you stated in the your explanations, you explained that the MOU does not take effect until “7/12/10″ but each new “fiscal” year starts on 7/1 of each year. Then is it safe to say, that mandatory furlough days can be taken starting on 7/1/10?
Furlough days can be taken voluntarily at any point prior to the start of the MOU contract, thanks to the city’s extension of the “voluntary furlough” program.
However, the mandatory furlough days will NOT count toward the 48 hours of required time off until the effective date of our new MOU contract, which will be July 12th.
Thanks for your question!
I pose the same question to you. According to the new Furlough procedures, it states that negotiated furloughs go into effect 7/1/10. Just need you to clarify that furlough days taken on this day and after will go towards the mandatory furlough days, which is 48hrs. Please advise. Thanks for your help.
One other point, when was it discussed that we had to take furlough days according to a schedule? I have not read in any minutes or notes that mandatory days were going to be mandated to a schedule. When I voted for this new contract there was no discussion as to a schedule. I was under that impression that I would be able to take the days as I pleased (of course with approval by my supervisor, but when I pleased.)
Thanks.
The MOU always goes into effect on the first day of the first FULL pay period in July.
We heard from our division director yesterday that the unions have the information on furlough policies and any questions should go to the union. Have you heard anything on what the new policy states?
Jacquelene,
The official city policy on furlough time is still in draft form at this time. When the policy is made official we will post it directly to this site for reference.
Thanks,
Steve Ryan
I have been trying to find out about retirement conversions. The current MOU only states the following:
“A unit member who has accumulated a minimum of seven hundred and fifty (750) qualifying hours or more of accrued and unused sick leave at the time of a duty related retirement shall be eligible for payment of an amount of compensation equal to twenty five (25%) of his base hourly rate for all hours in excess of two hundred and fifty (250) hours.”
(http://afscme2960.org/mou-index/section-3-4/)
I thought an employee could covert 2,080 hours of sick leave in return for one year more of retirment? Has this changed recently?
Thank you,
Concerned employee