VERO BEACH — The Vero Beach City Council on Tuesday rejected a request by the city’s largest labor union for nearly 12 percent in raises and longevity pay over a two-year period, and instead, approved a one-time 3 percent raise.
The Vero Beach City Council also approved a $1 per hour increase for dual-certified water and sewer plant operators and a small increase for shift workers.
The total financial impact of all these changes had not yet been calculated by city staff, as some of the provisions were negotiated on the fly in Tuesday’s special call Council meeting.
Combined with raises already given to police and raises that would be extended to other, non-union employees, it was estimated that the union agreements could cost more than $210,000 in the current fiscal year. That accounts for nearly all the City’s budgeted $227,000 unappropriated budget surplus.
If ratified by the Teamsters Local 769, the changes would become effective March 1. The raises, plus numerous concessions tentatively agreed to by the Teamsters on sick and vacation payouts, health insurance benefits and pensions, will now go before the members of the Teamsters blue-collar and clerical/technical bargaining units for a vote.
Teamsters Business Agent Steve Myers represented the union’s more than 275 employees and attorney Jason Odom represented the City management’s position in the quasi-judicial proceeding.
The parties have been trying to iron out a contract since last summer, to no avail, and finally declared impasse over salaries and wages.
Rank-and-file City employees have received no raises since 2008 because salaries were frozen after the real estate downturn that year. Vero Beach workers also took furloughs in 2009 and 2010 due to reduced property tax revenues as home values took a sharp downturn.
As the economy rebounds, the City remains cautious about awarding large annual increases as were done in the past. Instead of approving two years’ worth of raises as the Teamsters requested, the council voted on a 3 percent increase just for the current year, and then to re-open the wage and salary portion of the contract this summer for the upcoming year which starts Oct. 1.
If union members feel that the raises offered by the city do not adequately offset the concessions on pensions, health insurance, sick and vacation pay tentatively agreed to by the union, the parties could be tossed back into negotiations over the open articles of the contract.
The raises were approved with a 4-1 vote, with Councilwoman Pilar Turner being the lone dissenter. Turner had proposed a 2.5 percent increase, a motion that died for lack of a second.
Vice Mayor Jay Kramer expressed his reasoning for only wanting to commit to a one-year increase.
“Before I make a long-term decision on this I would like to see what our tax base is going to do in the budget,” Kramer said.