Posted on 02/28/2008 8:19:16 PM PST by SmithL
VALLEJO -- Eleventh hour talks between city officials and public safety labor unions resulted in a tentative agreement today designed to keep Vallejo's coffers from running dry in a month, city and union officials said Thursday.
Both sides held last-minute talks to salvage a deal Wednesday night and Thursday, hours before the council was set to vote on possibly filing for bankruptcy.
Mayor Osby Davis revealed the existence of the tentative agreement shortly before entering a closed-door session with the council on labor negotiations.
Vallejo firefighters union president Kurt Henke said "we have a framework of an agreement. The council will look at it to see if it's acceptable."
Henke said that it's possible that a special council meeting will be held Monday to go over the proposed deal with the public.
"I feel very positive," Henke said. "I think the mayor and (assistant city manager) Craig Whittom are under very trying circumstances. We have developed a good platform to solve the city's long-term fiscal problems."
Neither Davis nor Henke would offer details.
Absent a labor agreement, City Manager Joe Tanner had recommended the council authorize the city to file for bankruptcy protection, according to a staff report issued Monday
Several hundred residents and numerous media outlets crammed into Council Chambers for the historic vote. Vallejo's financial plight has drawn nationwide media attention as many cities face the challenge of funding services with dwindling revenues.
Vallejo faces a $6 million general fund shortfall, the result of sales, property taxes and other revenues falling far behind expenses.
Unhappy that public safety employees take the largest slice of the general fund pie, some have said unaffordable labor union contracts shoulder a big part of the blame for the city's financial emergency.
Bankruptcy, for some residents, has been viewed as a way for the city to get a fresh start, particularly by reworking the labor contracts.
Vallejo's fiscal crisis is not a one-year event. The deficit is expected to deepen to nearly $14 million next fiscal year and even more the following year, signaling an ongoing structural imbalance in the city budget.
Millions of dollars in staffing and service cuts, such as cutting 40 city employee jobs, including 12 sworn police officers may be cut to balance the budget. City staff are also calling for cuts to transportation and community service organizations.
Coming to a village near you.
We’ll likely see this next in Minnesota. They are looking at a billion dollar deficit, although they have a “rainy day” fund of nearly that much in inventory right now.
This is just the start of California’s state-wide public employees secret union deals finally exposed.
Let’s all retire at 25 years at 100% plus full medical benefits. That’s where it’s heading.
It is almost impossible to find out what California public employees are paid. Our democratic leaders just keep giving and giving.
I think you meant republican. Both elected Democrats and Republicans have given in the public employee unions.
Let me guess. They didn't find a way to end the giveaway of other people's money.
They simply devised a new scam to push the day of reckoning forward into the future as far as they can...
...Just as the doofus actor dinglenator is doing to the State of California...
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