HUNTINGTON BEACH : Plan to Lay Off 3 Firefighters Dropped

The city’s top administrator has officially withdrawn a tentative proposal that would have laid off three firefighters, a move that a union leader said has helped to jump-start stalled contract negotiations.

City Administrator Michael T. Uberuaga announced this week that he is no longer considering a budget-tightening suggestion that would have eliminated paramedic vans and moved paramedics onto fire engines, reducing the firefighting force by three or four members.

Frigid relations between the city and the firefighters have since shown their first signs of a thaw, union President Curt Campbell said Wednesday.

City officials say that Uberuaga’s announcement at Monday’s City Council meeting had nothing to do with recent progress in the languishing contract negotiations.

The Huntington Beach Firefighters Assn., which has been working without a contract since October, 1990, regarded it as a serious threat, and withdrew from the arbitration process.

Union leaders and city officials eventually agreed to discuss the staffing issue separately from the formal arbitration process, resuming the effort to resolve the contract dispute.

In the meantime, however, union officials have used the issue to rally public support behind them. The association in recent weeks has gathered more than 5,900 signatures from residents urging the City Council not to cut back fire or paramedic services, Campbell said.

Campbell said he believes the public campaign helped prompt Uberuaga’s announcement, although Uberuaga said it had no effect.

Uberuaga is revising an original list of $5 million in spending reductions down to $3.5 million. After meeting with department managers recently, he decided that the new package, though not yet complete, will not include the paramedic-van elimination, he said.

The key issue in the firefighters’ ongoing contract dispute is salaries.

The association--which represents the city’s firefighters, fire engineers, captains, paramedics and dispatchers--argues that its members are underpaid compared to other firefighting agencies.

City officials are offering a pay package larger than the raises given any other city employees this year, but say that the city budget crisis prevents them from budging further.

The union is seeking a three-year package including raises of 23.5% for firefighters and fire engineers, and 21.5% for all its other members.

The city is offering 21.5% pay hikes over three years for firefighters, 20.5% for fire engineers and 19.5% for all other employees.

Firefighters now earn from $31,000 to $40,080 per year.