Lost in all the news recently about a proposal for higher salaries for the Kaua’i County mayor, the prosecuting attorney and appointed county administrators has been the fact that the county’s unionized employees – thanks to the collective bargaining process
Lost in all the news recently about a proposal for higher salaries for the
Kaua’i County mayor, the prosecuting attorney and appointed county
administrators has been the fact that the county’s unionized employees – thanks
to the collective bargaining process – have been getting their
raises.
Salary hikes for Mayor Maryanne Kusaka and others, which were
recommended by the Salary Commission, were rejected this month by a County
Council committee. Meanwhile, some department heads are making more than the
mayor, some unionized employees are in line for annual raises of more than
$1,700, and one union may be close to striking.
Collective bargaining –
contract negotiations – is a legally required process. Representatives of
county government and its various unions hammer out the contracts, usually
every four years.
Recently approved contracts carry into fiscal year
2003.
County spokeswoman Beth Tokioka said the county is represented in
these negotiations by personnel director Alvin Tanigawa.
Four unions
represent a variety of county employees.
The Hawaii Fire Fighters Union and
the United Public Workers (UPW), which represents laborers and other workers,
haven’t yet negotiated new contracts.
According to the county’s Personnel
Services Department, negotiations with the UPW are ongoing. At present, the
county and UPW leaders are awaiting a decision by the labor mediation board. At
issue is pay and the duration of the contract (two or four years).
The
council was briefed Wednesday in executive session by county attorney Hartwell
Blake about preparations “in anticipation of a strike by the UPW.”
Deputy
county attorney Margaret Hanson said the union had taken a strike vote already
but hasn’t acted upon it.
A labor board decision is expected by the end of
this week, and the union will then decide what to do.
Although hopeful
there will be no strike, county officials are preparing for the
worst.
Blake said the last two labor strikes affecting the public on Kaua’i
took place in the early 1980s, when there was a garbage strike and a teachers’
strike.
The negotiations with the Hawai`i Fire Fighters Association is
already in the hands of an arbitrator.
The three-member arbitration panel,
headed by arbitrator Thomas Angelo of California, is reportedly close to
awarding a contract that would give firefighters comparable raises to those
already negotiated by other unions representing police, white-collar and
blue-collar personnel.
The state’s police officers recently won a four-year
contract in arbitration.
The Hawaii Government Employees Association
recently negotiated contracts that will pay blue-collar supervisory workers
such as a grounds maintenance supervisor, a construction maintenance supervisor
or a golf course maintenance supervisor $30,564 the next fiscal year (2001-02).
Currently, these positions are paid $29,388 per annum.
HGEA also negotiated
a contract for non-supervisor, white-collar positions, including secretaries,
personnel assistants and radio dispatchers. These positions, which currently
pay $19,320, will rise to $20,904 July 1, 2001.
HGEA also negotiated new
contracts for white-collar supervisors, including supervising meter readers,
police records supervisors and the tax collections supervisor.
These
positions pay $27,480, a sum that will rise to $29,712 in July of
2001.
HGEA also negotiated contracts for upper-echelon white-collar
workers, including accountants, engineers and real property tax appraisers.
They currently are paid $48,980, a figure that will rise to $50,940 at the
start of fiscal year 2001-02.
Under contracts negotiated by SHOPO (State of
Hawai`i Organization of Police Officers), the lowest-paid police officer in the
county, according to figures released by the county administration, made
$30,876 for fiscal year 1999-2000. That salary rose to $34,306 for fiscal year
2001-02 and bumps up once more next fiscal year, to $36,072.
Things are
almost always better, financially, toward the top of an employment chain. The
Police Department is no exception.
Under terms of the newly negotiated
contract, a police lieutenant who was making $56,364 was bumped up to $56,928
for fiscal year 2000-01. This raise is only $564, but it gets better in fiscal
year 2001-02, climbing to $58,644.
A police division head makes $80,136, a
salary which jumps to $83,340 in fiscal year 2001-02.
Police chief George
Freitas currently earns $66,073.
But a police division head isn’t the
highest-paid employee on the county rolls. Neither is Kusaka, the elected head
of county government, whose annual salary is $73,118. That honor falls to the
seven Public Works division heads, whose current salaries of $81,444 will rise
to $84,696 in fiscal year 2001-02.
All seven, whose names the county
wouldn’t release due to privacy constraints, are supervised by county engineer
Cesar Portugal, whose salary is $69,371.
Overall, as of Oct. 12, the county
had 882 employees covered by collective bargaining contracts.
Out of the
county’s total budget of approximately $67 million, $41.3 million goes to
payroll (salary and fringe benefits). That number accounts for 62 percent of
the county’s total operating budget. The total payroll devoted to union
employees is $38.4 million, leaving $2.9 million for elected officials,
including the mayor and Prosecuting Attorney Mike Soong (current salary
$69,371), and appointees such as the Kusaka’s administrative assistant, Wally
Rezentes Sr., department heads and deputy department heads.
According to
the state of Hawai`i data book, the median family income on Kaua`i is
$40,164.
Staff writer Dennis Wilken can be reached at 245-3681 (ext.
252) and dwilken@pulitzer.net