San Francisco Opera musicians OK new contract

Musicians of the San Francisco Opera Orchestra ratified a five-year contract with the company that will restore pay cuts made during the previous contract.

The agreement was reached after a week of negotiations and well in advance of the current contract’s expiration date in August, representatives from both sides said.

“Both sides were ecstatic,” said trumpeter Bill Holmes, who chaired the players’ negotiating committee. “When does that ever happen?”

The orchestra musicians, represented by Local 6 of the American Federation of Musicians, accepted a pay cut of nearly 5.5% in 2003, when the company was running large budget deficits.

The new contract uses the 2003 pay rate, an annual guaranteed compensation of $66,910, as a baseline. It calls for annual increases of 2% in each of the first two years and 4% in each of the last three, to reach a guaranteed minimum salary of $80,819 in the final year of the contract.

The contract also increases the hours of the musicians’ workweek and ends health benefits for retired musicians.

“I was totally impressed by them, by their reasonableness as well as their ability to protect their constituency,” General Director David Gockley said. “It was a great symbolic thing for this to come together so soon into this administration.”