BTinSF
05-16-2009, 02:24 AM
1,000 city employees to lose their jobs
About 1,000 city employees will be laid off this summer, the mayor's office announced this evening.
The announcement comes after members of SEIU 1021 -- which covers more than 11,000 city workers like janitors, security guards and health care workers -- rejected changes to their contract that would have saved the city $38 million in the 2009-10 fiscal year that starts July 1.
The mayor's office said 288 workers would be out of a job May 22. Another 700 or so would be given pink slips by the end of the month and lose their jobs by the end of July.
We broke the story on how this all came about. Read it (below) and check out the latest on the layoff announcement in Saturday's paper.
Source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/cityinsider/detail?entry_id=40215&tsp=1
S.F. union rejects agreement - layoffs imminent
Heather Knight,Marisa Lagos, Chronicle Staff Writers
Friday, May 15, 2009
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom on Thursday said layoffs of hundreds of union members will begin immediately and demanded millions more in cuts from his departments following the rejection of contract concessions by the city's biggest union.
Members of SEIU 1021 - which covers more than 11,000 city workers including janitors, security guards and health care workers - rejected changes to their contract that would have saved the city $38 million in the 2009-10 fiscal year that starts July 1. Newsom hoped SEIU would agree to concessions, prompting other unions to follow suit for a total savings of $90 million.
The agreement negotiated by union leaders included putting off layoffs scheduled for May 1 until Aug. 7, keeping a 3.75 percent pay increase, eliminating holiday pay for 11 days in 2009 and 2010 (though workers would still receive time-and-a-half if they worked holidays and get to accrue nine floating holidays) and staving off any new layoffs until after Nov. 15.
The mayor admitted Thursday that the other unions were now unlikely to agree to their own givebacks. His proposed budget is due to the Board of Supervisors by June 1. The thick budget book was scheduled to be shipped to the printer Tuesday, but that has now been pushed back.
The city's $6.6 billion budget has a $438 million deficit, and the mayor was counting on the $90 million to help fill it. His budget director, Nani Coloretti, said the city now needs to find about $180 million to reach the $438 million mark - and that doesn't include an expected $93 million hit if Tuesday's state ballot measures fail and the state taps local governments to bridge its own deficit.
"This blows a huge hole in the budget," Newsom said of SEIU's move. "There will be dramatic layoffs and service cuts related to this."
SEIU and other labor leaders declined to comment or provide the vote breakdown. Mark Gomez, a strategic analyst with the union, said, "I think it was a relatively close vote. We're going to meet with leadership to figure out the next step."
Newsom held an emergency meeting with his department heads Thursday afternoon. More than 100 people filled a conference room on the third floor of City Hall to hear the grim news from the mayor.
He had previously asked them to each come up with proposed cuts totaling 25 percent of their budgets, but demanded another combined $56 million in cuts be delivered to his desk by today at noon.
At the meeting, he blamed union heads for "a failure of leadership," according to a source in the room. He said the union negotiators failed to convey the consequences of a "no" vote, and that rank-and-file members likely didn't realize hundreds of them will immediately lose their jobs.
The city attorney's office is vetting whether a mayoral declaration of a "state of emergency" - which isn't believed to have been used in San Francisco since the Great Depression - would allow Newsom to cut wages of city workers across the board. The mayor has given no indication he is ready to declare an emergency.
Newsom said the union's refusal would also jeopardize the city's ability to get voter approval for a variety of tax-raising measures on the November ballot because people won't want to dig deeper into their own pockets to pay for other people's raises.
"I'm not going to be able to go to the voters and ask for tax increases just to pay for raises - that's not something that will pass," he said.
That was a sentiment shared by Steve Falk, head of the Chamber of Commerce. He said recent meetings between business and labor leaders to craft budget-related measures for the November ballot had been incredibly productive.
"We have to rethink now where we go, how we proceed," he said.
There was grumbling among some rank-and-file union members that the bargaining team and leadership weren't representing them well. Some members also expressed concern about granting the city wage concessions without clear commitment that specific tax and revenue measures would be on a November ballot.
E-mail the writers at hknight@sfchronicle.com and mlagos@sfchronicle.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/05/15/BAVA17KNGP.DTL
About 1,000 city employees will be laid off this summer, the mayor's office announced this evening.
The announcement comes after members of SEIU 1021 -- which covers more than 11,000 city workers like janitors, security guards and health care workers -- rejected changes to their contract that would have saved the city $38 million in the 2009-10 fiscal year that starts July 1.
The mayor's office said 288 workers would be out of a job May 22. Another 700 or so would be given pink slips by the end of the month and lose their jobs by the end of July.
We broke the story on how this all came about. Read it (below) and check out the latest on the layoff announcement in Saturday's paper.
Source: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/cityinsider/detail?entry_id=40215&tsp=1
S.F. union rejects agreement - layoffs imminent
Heather Knight,Marisa Lagos, Chronicle Staff Writers
Friday, May 15, 2009
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom on Thursday said layoffs of hundreds of union members will begin immediately and demanded millions more in cuts from his departments following the rejection of contract concessions by the city's biggest union.
Members of SEIU 1021 - which covers more than 11,000 city workers including janitors, security guards and health care workers - rejected changes to their contract that would have saved the city $38 million in the 2009-10 fiscal year that starts July 1. Newsom hoped SEIU would agree to concessions, prompting other unions to follow suit for a total savings of $90 million.
The agreement negotiated by union leaders included putting off layoffs scheduled for May 1 until Aug. 7, keeping a 3.75 percent pay increase, eliminating holiday pay for 11 days in 2009 and 2010 (though workers would still receive time-and-a-half if they worked holidays and get to accrue nine floating holidays) and staving off any new layoffs until after Nov. 15.
The mayor admitted Thursday that the other unions were now unlikely to agree to their own givebacks. His proposed budget is due to the Board of Supervisors by June 1. The thick budget book was scheduled to be shipped to the printer Tuesday, but that has now been pushed back.
The city's $6.6 billion budget has a $438 million deficit, and the mayor was counting on the $90 million to help fill it. His budget director, Nani Coloretti, said the city now needs to find about $180 million to reach the $438 million mark - and that doesn't include an expected $93 million hit if Tuesday's state ballot measures fail and the state taps local governments to bridge its own deficit.
"This blows a huge hole in the budget," Newsom said of SEIU's move. "There will be dramatic layoffs and service cuts related to this."
SEIU and other labor leaders declined to comment or provide the vote breakdown. Mark Gomez, a strategic analyst with the union, said, "I think it was a relatively close vote. We're going to meet with leadership to figure out the next step."
Newsom held an emergency meeting with his department heads Thursday afternoon. More than 100 people filled a conference room on the third floor of City Hall to hear the grim news from the mayor.
He had previously asked them to each come up with proposed cuts totaling 25 percent of their budgets, but demanded another combined $56 million in cuts be delivered to his desk by today at noon.
At the meeting, he blamed union heads for "a failure of leadership," according to a source in the room. He said the union negotiators failed to convey the consequences of a "no" vote, and that rank-and-file members likely didn't realize hundreds of them will immediately lose their jobs.
The city attorney's office is vetting whether a mayoral declaration of a "state of emergency" - which isn't believed to have been used in San Francisco since the Great Depression - would allow Newsom to cut wages of city workers across the board. The mayor has given no indication he is ready to declare an emergency.
Newsom said the union's refusal would also jeopardize the city's ability to get voter approval for a variety of tax-raising measures on the November ballot because people won't want to dig deeper into their own pockets to pay for other people's raises.
"I'm not going to be able to go to the voters and ask for tax increases just to pay for raises - that's not something that will pass," he said.
That was a sentiment shared by Steve Falk, head of the Chamber of Commerce. He said recent meetings between business and labor leaders to craft budget-related measures for the November ballot had been incredibly productive.
"We have to rethink now where we go, how we proceed," he said.
There was grumbling among some rank-and-file union members that the bargaining team and leadership weren't representing them well. Some members also expressed concern about granting the city wage concessions without clear commitment that specific tax and revenue measures would be on a November ballot.
E-mail the writers at hknight@sfchronicle.com and mlagos@sfchronicle.com.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/05/15/BAVA17KNGP.DTL
