Down to six months before an emotional Departure Day at financially-strapped City Hall, City Councilman Scott Malsin has raised the unorthodox spectre of excusing a senior segment of city employees from new regulations that shrink or eliminate certain crucial benefits.
His objective: To ward off a huge personnel exodus throughout the work force, especially in the leadership of the police and fire departments.
Elimination of some benefits and severe narrowing of others widely takes effect on Jan. 1, and among the casualties, or retirees, may be Mr. Malsin himself.
“If we impose the conditions that already have been approved by the Management Group and the Employees Assn., I am concerned there will be a substantial number of retirements among our most senior, most valuable employees,” Mr. Malsin said.
“They will leave because the economic impact on them will far exceed the value of remaining employed. I am confident there is a cost-effective way to manage the issue — by grandfathering in employees who are close to retirement age.
“I am talking about employees who are close to retirement age, for instance members of our police command staff, fire command staff and obviously other city employees as well. I think it is easy for anyone to understand if we were to lose a substantial part of our leadership in our safety agencies, there would be a severe impact.”
Whoa There
When City Manager John Nachbar, busy at the bargaining table with the six city unions, was asked if he has been exploring this avenue, he said:
“I can’t divulge what is going on in these negotiations. I would say, though, it is really premature to pass judgment on where these negotiations will end up.
“At this point we are in negotiations with the POA (Police Officers Assn.) and police management. We have not even gotten to the table yet with fire management and fire.
“You need to be really careful about characterizing where these negotiations are going and where they will end up.
“Negotiations, especially with fire, haven’t even begun yet. It’s really, really premature to try and anticipate what is going to happen. I can’t go into detail because that would be a breach of faith.”
Time to Act?
Mr. Malsin said that extraordinary efforts should be made to retain new benefits-vulnerable veterans since “employee morale has suffered greatly already.”
He argued that if many retirements could be headed off, the financial difference in City Hall’s till would be modest.
“There is no question our current benefits structure is unsustainable,” the Councilman said. “I am sure our employees understand that and that they want to help us. The real key is how to transition from the current set of benefits to new ones.”
Saying that he prefers workers be given a choice, Mr. Malsin added: “I believe people make the best decisions for themselves and their families.”
