Aiding Fellow Worker Raised to New Level

Here’s a new one: Employees telling the boss to take back their raises and save them.

That’s the case at City Hall in Vista. Twenty-six managers have forfeited a recent 2% pay raise in order to save one of several positions expected to be axed soon to help balance the city’s budget. The managers’ offer saves the city about $33,000.

“This is completely voluntary,” said Vista City Manager Morris Vance. “But I think it’s a very responsible move in a day and age when public employees get criticized for being too many and overpaid.”

Meanwhile, a lower-level city worker, engineering staff assistant Terri Corison, has circulated a similar petition, calling for the approximately 100 general city employees to forfeit a 3 1/4% pay raise in January.

However, her drive was immediately squashed, she said, by leaders of the Vista City Employees Assn. Spokesmen for the union want proof from the city that layoffs will indeed be necessary.

Corison, an eight-year employee, said the city is in trouble and all employees should be willing to forgo a raise to ensure no one is laid off in the middle of a recession. But when she went to the union to tell them of her efforts, she said, they asked her to stop handing out the petitions.

“They (union leaders) believe it’s all just a ploy in terms of the layoff talk, and they say there’s nothing to back it up,” Corison said. “But the layoffs are coming. This isn’t a city of Vista ploy; it’s a statewide problem.”

True enough, said Kelly Irving, a staff representative to the Vista City Employees Assn. But he said that, as far as union leaders know, the city has yet to determine exactly how large its deficit will be in light of various state cuts.

Irving, who says he had no knowledge of a union employee starting a petition drive to forfeit a pay raise, won’t consider a voluntary raise forfeiture before the city decides exactly how large its deficit for fiscal 1993 is and whether there are alternatives to layoffs.

But the managers think the only alternative is forsaking pay increases.

After City Manager Vance announced two weeks ago that state budget cuts would result in three or four layoffs, city management analyst Deborah Jordan passed a petition among managers calling for Vance to rescind management’s 2% raise.

“I didn’t want to sit here with my raise while others lost their jobs,” said Jordan, an 11-year city employee.

The feared layoffs stem from a $640,000 budget deficit created by the state’s decision in July to gobble up 9% of Vista’s property tax revenue, Vance said. The budget had just been balanced by cutting 16 city positions, transferring $1.1 million in reserves to the general fund and increasing assessment district fees.

The city now plans to cover the deficit with $376,000 saved by giving smaller raises to city employees in fiscal 1993; $92,000 in maintenance and operational cuts to programs, such as Chamber of Commerce support, and $172,000 in savings through position deletions--including several layoffs--and attrition.

Vista’s department heads have agreed not to take a pay increase this year. Vista Fire Assn. employees got a 3% pay increase, while the city’s general employees, covered by the Vista City Employees Assn., received a 5% raise.

City council members are due for an 8% pay raise this November, Vance said, but three of the five have already vowed not to accept it. He was unsure of the others.

In light of cutbacks throughout the city, all but two of the city’s 28 managers--positions that fall directly below department heads--signed Jordan’s petition.

Last year managers received a 4% raise, and forfeiture of their 2% pay hike this year means they will each lose about $1,200 gross pay on salaries ranging between $40,000 and $50,000, whereas lower-level city employees earn between $20,000 and $40,000, Jordan said.

One of the managers didn’t want to give up the raise, and the other who didn’t sign Jordan’s petition was on vacation at the time.

“If 2% saves someone job, then I’m happy to give it up,” said manager Pete Nieblas, a seven-year sanitation engineer. “There aren’t many jobs out there. If these guys get laid off, they’ll have a tough time finding one.”

Hiram Andrade, an associate planner and associate vice president of the employee union, says that, despite the budget crunch, the city is still hiring. “We’re talking about laying off (general employees) but we’re hiring managers,” he said.

The city plans to hire a public works manager, with a salary of about $70,000. However, one management position in that department was eliminated this year and another position now vacant there will likely be cut soon, according to Arlene Berman, Vista’s personnel manager.

“We’re dealing with a situation where staff can’t be replaced. I’m down two fire inspectors right now,” said Paul Dawson, Vista’s fire marshal and one of the manager’s who forfeited a raise.

“I’d certainly do it (give up a raise) again if we’re in the same boat next year. This is not the time for me to be looking for a pay raise.”