City
of
And
Teamsters,
Local 252
Interest
Arbitration
Arbitrator: Gary L. Axon
Date
Issued:
Arbitrator:
Axon; Gary L.
Case #: 11884-I-95-00255
Employer:
City of
Date Issued:
IN THE MATTER OF )
)
INTEREST ARBITRATION ) CASE NO. 11884-1-95-255
)
BETWEEN )
ARBITRATOR'S AWARD
)
TEAMSTERS LOCAL 252, ) 1996 INTEREST ARBITRATION
)
)
and )
)
)
City. )
HEARING SITE: City
Hall
HEARING DATE:
POST-HEARING BRIEFS DUE: Postmarked
RECORD CLOSED ON RECEIPT OF
BRIEFS:
REPRESENTING THE
Davies,
Roberts and Reid
Attorneys
at Law
REPRESENTING THE CITY: Otto
G. Klein, III
Heller,
Ehrman, White
& McAuliffe
6100
701
ARBITRATOR: GaryL. Axon
1465
Pinecrest Terrace
(541)
488-1573
Table of
Contents
ISSUE Page
Introduction 2
1 - Wages 6
2 - Premium Pay 32
3 - Holidays/Vacations 33
I. INTRODUCTION
This case is an interest arbitration conducted pursuant
to
the Public Employees Collective Bargaining Act.
The parties to
this
dispute are Teamsters Union Local 252 (hereinafter "Unioni")
and
the City of
that
covered the period
The parties entered
into negotiations to reach
a successor
Agreement
to the 1992-94 Collective Bargaining Agreement. The
parties
were successful in resolving most of the issues that
divided
them in contract negotiations. Three
issues were submitted
to
the Arbitrator for resolution.
City has a population of
12,730 persons.
populated
with a population of 24.7 persons per square mile. The
1995, the patrol officers fell
within the statutory definition of
"uniform
personnel" which granted
them interest arbitration
according
to the Public Employees Collective Bargaining Act. RCW
41.56.030(7) (b) (i) . Prior to
bargaining
unit were statutorily prohibited from engaging in any
economic
activity in support of its bargaining proposals.
At
the commencement of the
arbitration hearing the
parties
agreed to use a list of comparable jurisdictions to assist
in
the resolution of this contract dispute.
The ten jurisdictions
are
the same group of comparators used by an Ad Hoc Salary Review
Committee in 1992 composed of
individuals from management and
labor. The jurisdictions stipulated to as comparable
for the
purposes
of this interest arbitration are:
Chehalis Tumwater
Kelso Ellensburg
Issaquah Hoquiam
Enumclaw
Marysville
Because of the stipulation of
the parties, it was unnecessary for
either
the City or the
the
appropriate jurisdictions with which to compare
the
purposes of establishing the terms of the successor Agreement.
The hearing was tape recorded by the Arbitrator as an
extension
of his personal note taking. Testimony
of the witnesses
was
received under oath. At the arbitration
hearing the parties
were
given the full opportunity to present written evidence, oral
testimony
and argument. The parties provided the Arbitrator
with
substantial
written documentation in support of their respective
cases.
The parties also submitted comprehensive and lengthy
post-hearing
briefs in support of their respective positions taken
at
arbitration. The three issues identified
for an Award by this
Arbitrator
are as follows:
1. Wages
2. Premium Pay
3. Holidays/Vacations
This Arbitrator carefully reviewed and evaluated all of
the
evidence and argument submitted pursuant to the criteria
established
by RCW 41.56.465. The approach of your
Arbitrator in
writing
the Award will be to summarize
the major and most
persuasive
evidence and argument presented by the parties on each
of
the issues. After the introduction of
the issue and positions
of
the parties, I will then state the basic findings and rationale
which
caused the Arbitrator to make the Award on the individual
issues.
The statutory criteria are standards or guidelines to aid
an
interest arbitrator in reaching a decision in a case subject to
this
procedure in resolving disputes. The
statutory factors to be
considered
by the Arbitrator may be summarized as follows:
(a) the
constitutional and statutory
authority
of the employer;
(b) the stipulations of the parties;
(c) the wages, hours
and conditions of
employment
of like personnel of like employers
of
similar size on the West Coast of the
(d) the average cosumer
prices for goods and
services, commonly
known as the
cost of
living;
(e) changes
in any of
the foregoing
circumstances during the pendency of the
proceedings;
and
(f) such other factors, not confined to
the
foregoing,
which are normally or traditionally
taken
into consideration in the determination
of
wages, hours and conditions of employment.
For those employees in a city with a population less than
15,000, consideration must
also be given to regional differences in
the
cost of living. The jurisdictions agreed to by the parties for
purposes
of comparison included cities from both eastern and
western
A. Background
The most significant fact in this case is that the
parties
have agreed upon wage increases for 1995, 1996 and 1997.
Pursuant to the parties'
agreement, bargaining unit members will
get a
2.7% increase for all of 1995, a 2.25% increase for 1996 and
an
increase based upon the change in the Seattle/Tacoma CPI-U Index
for
1997. Thus, the issue of annual wage
increases for the members
of
this bargaining unit is not in dispute.
social
security program. As such, there is no deduction from their
wages
for the employee contribution to the social security system
or
an employer cost for social security.
In 1987 the City implemented a salary schedule consisting
of
23 ranges with 7 steps per range. At that time, patrol officers
were
placed in Range 13 of the salary schedule where they have
remained
since 1987. The Union proposed moving
patrol officers to
Range 14 as of July 1995. The City objects to the movement of the
patrol
officers from Range 13 to Range 14 of the salary schedule.
B. The Union
The Union takes the position that the time has come to
adjust
the salary range for patrol officers which has been in
existence
for nearly ten years. The Union submits
its proposal
will
protect the integrity of the 7-step advancement system, as
well
as spreading out the economic impact on the City over time.
The Union is proposing moving
individual patrol officers up one
step
on Range 14. As of July 1995, seven of
the twenty-two patrol
officers
in the bargaining unit had topped out at Range 13, Step G.
Under the Union's proposal,
those seven officers would receive a
new
step advancement date as of July 1, 1995. The remaining patrol
officers
would retain their existing step advancement date for
further
adjustments.
The Union maintains its position is supported by the
internal
comparators. Teamsters Local 252
represents the clerical
and
support staff. The contract for that
bargaining unit called
for
negotiated COLA increases and movement of some employees to a
higher
range on the salary schedule. Under the
police clerical
contract,
the Department's secretary was also moved up one complete
range.
Turning to the external comparators, the Union begins by
noting
the City spent a considerable amount of time attempting to
persuade
the Arbitrator that Issaquah should be excluded from the
group. The Union maintains that the City's attempt
to exclude
Issaquah from the comparator
group was based on flawed information.
Moreover, the City's Exhibits 10 through 13 list each of
the
comparator cities by name and purport to set forth data
pertaining
to population, demographics, per capita personal income,
median
household income, average net earnings and average wage for
covered
employment. At the arbitration hearing it was learned that
the
data as to the comparator cities was not based upon economic
data
on a city by city basis. The economic
data was instead culled
from
information as to the
entire county within which the
comparator
cities are located. The legislature in
developing the
interest
arbitration statute expressly provides that comparisons
should
be made to "employment of like personnel of like employers
of
similar size." The statutory directive to interest arbitrators
has
resulted in arbitrators routinely rejecting comparing uniform
personnel
in cities to uniform personnel in counties.
The statutory directive to interest arbitrators has
resulted
in arbitrators routinely comparing uniform personnel in
cities
to uniform personnel in other cities.
Nor is there support
for
comparing uniform personnel of the City to all personnel of all
employers
of all counties in which the mutually agreed upon
comparators
lie. The entire purpose of furnishing data on
comparator
cities is to provide an arbitrator the information to
make a
principled-based decision.
Union witness Mark Endresen
prepared a series of exhibits
which
included a breakdown of population, valuation and taxes as
provided
by the State Auditor. Un.
Exs.
2-11. Union
Exhibit 12
consisted
of eight separate summaries of raw data drawn from
information
contained in the State Auditor's Office reports. The
witness
also ranked compensation paid in the comparators based on
the
collective bargaining agreements from the ten cities. Endresen
compared
the longevity pay, educational incentive pay and whether
the
employer participated in social security in the ten other
cities.
Under the Union's proposal the highest step that any
patrol
officer would attain in 1995 would be Range 14, Step F which
has a
base pay of $3,254. This would place the
top step base pay
for a
patrol officer at Step G at $3,368 per month.
Without the
increase
in the range from Range 13 to Range 14, Centralia would be
ranked
number seven at $3,148 per month.
Union Exhibit 12, page 9 reflects various items of
compensation
including longevity pay, educational incentive and
FICA/Medicare in order to show
what the Union alleges is the actual
cost
of the proposal to the City. The Union
calculated the cost to
the
City with this proposal to move to Range 14 to be $3,527 per
month. If officers remained at Range 13 the top step
would cost
the
City $3,305 per month. The Union's
calculation of the total
cost
revealed the following rankings if the cost of FICA/Medicare
are
factored in for the comparators.
CITY TOTAL
1. Issaquah . . . $4062 MO.
2. Kelso . . . $3767 MO.
3. Enumclaw . . . $3681 MO.
4. Tumwater . . . $3594 MO.
5. Oak
Harbor . . . $3556 MO.
6A. Centralia(#14) . . $3527 MO.
6. Marysville . . . $3481