Pomona Ignores Arbitrator, Grants 8% Pay Increase

Ignoring the recommendations of an arbitrator, the City Council this week approved an average 8% salary increase for management-level employees, although it has so far refused to negotiate any raise for non-management workers.

The arbitrator, William S. Rule, recommended in December that non-management employees, also known as general service employees, receive 6% raises by July 1 and that any raise for managers be postponed until that date because of the city’s growing financial problems.

“To give a privilege to one group while denying it to another could be perceived as unfair, if not actually unfair,” he said in a recent telephone interview.

So disturbed was Rule by the city’s financial woes that he also suggested that it impose an assessment district and lay off an unspecified number of city employees.

His Ideas Not Binding

Rule, hired jointly by an association of general service employees and the city to mediate their stalled salary negotiations, did not indicate what he thought the management raises should be. His suggestions are not binding under the city Charter.

The general service employees are asking for a commitment from the city for some type of raise this fiscal year, but so far the city has offered only 6% in fiscal 1986-87.

Mayor G. Stanton Selby was angered by the report, contending that Rule was hired only to mediate the salary dispute with general service employees and that all his other recommendations were improper.

The management raise, approved by a 3-2 vote at a Monday evening study session, will provide an average 8% increase for management employees beginning March 1. The raises are retroactive to Feb. 1 because the council action cannot take effect for 30 days.

Before the raise, management employees’ pay ranged from $22,788 to $70,860 a year.

Council members Mark Nymeyer and Donna Smith dissented, saying they had reservations about an in-house salary survey upon which the increases were based. The survey conducted by city staff members compared salaries in Pomona to those in cities of comparable size and determined the amount of salary increases.

“You don’t let the people who will benefit from a raise figure out how much the raise will be,” Nymeyer said before the vote was taken.

Suspicions Allayed

Smith, who persuaded the council to delay a decision when the matter was first considered in September, said most of her suspicions about the way the survey was conducted--most notably, her initial fear that some information was deliberately hidden from the council--have been allayed.

“All that time I felt like there was a train whistle blowing and I was being railroaded,” Smith said.

But she said she voted against the measure because it would allow a 15% difference between a supervisor’s salary and that of his highest-paid employee, which she considered too great. The measure approved by the council includes the 15% gap, but also leaves open the possibility of changing the figure later. The council agreed to study that matter and to postpone the raise of City Administrator Ora Lampman, one of those who helped put the salary survey together, until it has decided whether the 15% gap is too much.

Lampman would have received a 2% raise, bringing his yearly salary to $72,228.

The three council members who approved the measure--Selby, Jay Gaulding and Vernon Weigand--said they were convinced the salary survey had been conducted objectively.

‘It’s Sour Grapes’

Weigand said that the management “adjustment” was part of a process that began in 1981 with general service workers, who received upward adjustments from then until January, 1985, and that any perception of unfairness was tantamount to ignoring the facts.

“It’s sour grapes and very unprofessional,” Weigand said. “It speaks of, ‘I want mine and nobody else gets any.’ ”

At a meeting Tuesday night of the Pomona City Employees Assn., the man hired to represent the group in contract negotiations urged city workers not to give up.

“If we give up they’re going to win,” said Robert Elliot, general manager of the San Bernardino Public Employees Assn. “What they did to you should be illegal.”

Alicia Alvarez, president of the Pomona group that hired Elliot to help represent them, shared Elliot’s anger.

“We paid for arbitration, we got the decision back and the city said, ‘Oh, well, so what,’ ” Alvarez said.

Elliot advised the employees to endorse all of Rule’s suggestions in the hope of stepping up pressure on the city to concede a raise.

‘Beyond His Jurisdiction’

Weigand, other council members and administrators have maintained that management adjustments are separate from contract negotiations with non-management workers, and that Rule was operating “beyond his jurisdiction” when he addressed the matter in his Dec. 27 report.

Rule, an independent arbitrator listed with the state Mediation and Conciliation Service, acknowledged in his report that the issue was beyond the scope of the conflict he had been hired to mediate. But he went on to chastise the city for what he called irresponsible financing over a period of years that has led to the current monetary crisis.

In his written opinion, Rule said that despite the city’s $1.3-million budget shortfall, which officials believe will grow to more than $4 million in the next fiscal year, a raise is essential if the city intends to keep qualified general service employees on the payroll. Council members Monday used the same argument to justify raising management pay.

Twenty-two employees have left the city for higher paying jobs in the last six months, city officials said. Many of those left after the council announced recently that it will examine the possibility of contracting with the county for police, fire and library services in an effort to save money. Contracting could result in a loss of jobs.

There are about 345 authorized general service and about 120 management positions in the city. The raise will affect about 100 management-level employees.

No Funds Available

Rule acknowledged the city’s budget problems but said lower-level employees should not bear the burden of errors made by past city councils. He agreed in his report with the city’s contention that it does not have the funds for a raise, and said later that was part of the reason he suggested a postponement of management adjustments, although money had already been set aside for the purpose.

The council sought to impose a citywide street lighting and landscaping assessment district in July to cover the $1.3-million shortfall. But a large-scale public protest caused council members to change their minds.

“The city has failed to live up to its financial responsibilities over the past several years and must now ‘bite the bullet,’ ” Rule wrote. “ . . . A combination of a substantial increase in revenue and some layoffs will be necessary to achieve this objective. The assessment district must be established . . . even if members of the public do object because they don’t understand the need.”

“That’s easy for him to say from the outside,” Selby said. “But anyone who had been in attendance at that last assessment district hearing would have a real understanding that it is practically impossible to override the will of the public.”

In a recent telephone interview, Rule said he believed the council should make clear to the public that raising revenue is crucial if the city is to continue providing essential services. All his recommendations are justified, Rule said, because of the severity of the city’s financial problems.

Insisted on Raise

The Pomona City Employees Assn. has insisted that in spite of the budget shortfall, the city give the general service employees a raise this year. Elliot said he believed Rule’s recommendation struck a blow in their favor.

“It’s a 95% vindication of what we’ve been saying all along,” Elliot said.

Elliot said the employees would even embrace Rule’s suggestion that workers be laid off rather than continue to be paid wages that, according to surveys conducted by the city and the League of California Cities, lag behind those in most other comparable cities by 7% to 13%.

“That’s what the layoff procedure is for,” Elliot said. “If you have too many employees we advise you to cut back the level of service.”

In the salary negotiations, the city has refused to agree to any pay increase for general service workers this year. Employee representatives have demanded at least some increase this fiscal year.