BASTA! in the News – 2008

Does Berkeley really need 1700 + city employees? Relative to the size of our population, this is almost 3 times greater than other comparable East Bay Cities. Berkeley recently elected to purchase the 1947 Center Street Building at a cost of at least 28 million to house this ever increasing number of city employees. While Council members and staff publicly talk about a hiring freeze and a ban on overtime city departments continue to hire for replacements and even for new positions. Some employees who retire are also being rehired as consultants. They receive full pay through their pensions and also receive equivalent amounts or even more as consultants. Also the Planning Department recently authorized 4 hours of overtime for 10 employees to clean their offices on Saturday January 24th. Berkeley's payroll expense now represents about 70% of total general fund money.
Should the union contract approved during the last two years which requires a minimum salary increase of 33% over a six year period be renegotiated? This is far in excess of the probable rate of inflation.
Is the new pension plan which guarantees retirement pay equal to 85% of top salary at age 50 for police and fire employees and 81% at age 55 for all other employees after 30 years of employment something that the city can afford? All employees also receive SRIP (supplemental retirement income pension) which is fully paid for by the city and they can voluntarily contribute to a third pension plan, similar to a 401K. With these three pension plans retiring employees, many of whom can choose to stop working in their fifties, will have a greater income during retirement for a period as long or longer than their time spent working for the city.
Why are so many employees on Workmen's Compensation Leave? City staff has recently told the Council that Workmens' Compensation costs are a major budget concern. The cost has doubled in the past few years from three million to over six million and is projected to go higher. The state legislature has been looking at revising the Workman's Compensation law and have funded studies on data.

A study by RAND is reported to contain the following claims data:

National Average 0.434 claims per 100 workers
California Average 1.221 claims per 100 workers

In reports to the Council staff has reported that in Berkeley 32.5 employees in public works are out on Workman's' Compensation leave. This is equivalent to 11 claims per 100 workers or about 25 times the national average.

In an effort to reduce claims city management negotiated with the various unions involved and came up with the following "solution," which has been approved by the council. If claims are reduced by 10% in the coming year then the city will give all employees a one time bonus in FY2006 at a cost of $670,000 which is equal to the estimated savings for one year if claims are reduced by 10%. This is rewarding employees for something that they should be expected to do as part of their normal job performance, and it will certainly not solve the problem.

In spite of all the above the city has been able to stay float for the last few years due to huge increases in income from the Real Property Transfer Tax and from the increase in property taxes due to increased assessment. Assessment Rolls have almost doubled in the last 8 years. Revenue from utility users taxes has also increased sharply due to cell phone use and higher PG&E bills.

Parking and traffic fine revenue has also been sharply increased by about 4 million. Traffic violations and parking fines historically have accounted for approximately 6 per cent of general fund revenue. The increase of 4 million dollars will bring parking fine revenue and traffic tickets to approximately 10% of general fund revenue. Council has approved the hiring of more parking enforcers. "Meter Maids" who the city calls Parking Enforcement Representatives (PERS) are given goals which are not quotas. The goal for each PERS is 1200 citations per month. A city memo says this is an easily attainable goal based on the number of parking violations actually observed within the various beats?

Assuming 7 productive hours per day, a ticket must be issued every 8 minutes to meet that goal. Assuming an average ticket fine of $35; the revenue produced by Each PERS is $42,000 per month or over $500,000 per year.

There aren't many businesses in town that can claim gross revenues of $500,000 per employee per year. If sick leave, vacation time, and holidays are taken into account tickets must be issued at a much faster rate to meet the "goal".

Parking enforcers have recently been seen in residential areas where they were previously not seen, ticketing cars parked facing the wrong way, across driveways, on sidewalks etc.

As the city payroll grows each year due to the negotiated increases this revenue source and others will have to grow by millions each year to keep up with salary and pension benefits. While each ticket may be technically correct the ill will generated toward city employees will be hard to overcome. Much of this revenue is extracted from lower income people whom the city claims it wants to help. This extra revenue will not repair a sidewalk, a street or a sewer Ð it will be needed to fill the sink hole created by city management and council for salary increases, pension benefits, and workman's compensation claims that are 25 times the national average.

Further increases in taxes for homeowners can not solve these problems. It seems evident that staff size, agreements for pay increases and retirement benefits negotiated by the city employee and workmen's compensation, are where the solutions to the budget woes lie. The problems were caused by the Council, Management, and the Employees' Unions and need to be solved by these same parties. The proposed 7 to 10 million parcel tax was pulled from the agenda when the union for fire personnel said they could not support it. However Presentations by city staff to council still propose one or more new tax measures for the November ballot. Call or write the Mayor and Council and express your view about new taxes.