City workers seek a more perfect union

By Dan MacArthur
Fossil Creek Current

Fort Collins voters will decide whether city workers can unionize and submit disputes to binding arbitration if proponents successfully petition to place the measure on the ballot.

Petition circulators stationed at shopping centers and grocery stores are attempting to collect the 8,894 signatures required to put the proposed city charter change before voters.

According to Chief Deputy City Clerk Rita Harris, the election could be scheduled as early as April 22, as proponents prefer, providing they submit the required signatures by Jan 14.

"As I understand, (the signature gathering) is going very well," said Rosemary Sheridan, of the Communications Workers of America Local 7707.

The CWA, along with the Northern Colorado Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #3, are organizing the drive to give all employees the right to unionize and demand binding arbitration. Police already gained the right to unionize in a 2004 vote, but their effort to gain binding arbitration was shot down by a 2-1 margin in 2006.

"We would like to get collective bargaining as soon as possible and not wait another year," Sheridan said in explaining the push for a spring election. City Clerk Wanda Krajicek estimated such a special election would cost $100,000.

The charter change proposed by the unions would grant city workers "the right to organize and be represented by an employee organization of their collective choice." All employees, other than those in executive or supervisory positions, would be eligible to join a union.

The chosen union would be the sole agent to "bargain collectively regarding terms and conditions of employment." The initiative, however, specifically prohibits employees from striking and the city from locking out employees.

But the real point of contention is a provision mandating binding arbitration in case of an impasse in negotiations. If the union and the city can't agree to a contract within 45 days, the initiative requires that all unresolved issues be submitted to binding arbitration.

The decision of the third-party arbitrator would be binding on the city and the union unless both sides could agree to a contract within 15 days following the arbitrator's decision. After that, the decision would become final but could be successfully challenged in court under exceptional circumstances.

It's that mandate for binding arbitration that sends Mayor Doug Hutchinson into a fury. Currently, he said, the city charter specifies that only the city council and city manager are responsible for setting employee compensation.

"Binding arbitration would give that authority to an unelected arbitrator --probably a Denver lawyer--to make that decision," Hutchinson said. "We lose control. He's not accountable to anybody."

But Sheridan insisted that the ability to organize and seek binding arbitration is necessary to give employees an equal footing in negotiating with a city government that routinely ignores and abuses its nearly 1,100 workers.

"Right now they don't have a voice," said Sheridan. "At least they collectively have power and stand together." An organizer primarily of government workers for 20 years, she said the CWA currently represents some 150,000 such employees nationwide.

Hutchinson concedes that city employees have some legitimate gripes that he pledged to address first thing after his election. "There was some unfair treatment," Hutchinson said. "I'm sure that's part of the reason (for the charter proposal)."

"There was a three-year period when wages were frozen. You can't treat people that way," Hutchinson added.

At the same time, the new Budgeting for Outcomes approach resulted in dramatic budget cuts, including the loss of more than 100 workers, placing a pall over city hall. But Hutchinson defended the cuts as painful but necessary so the city "could balance its budget and have the pay raises restored."

As a result, he said, employees received 4 percent raises this year with the potential for more when the city moves to a pay-for-performance compensation program in 2009.

But Hutchinson wasn't shy about similarly defending the need to reform through increased premiums and co-pays an "overly generous by any measure" employee health insurance plan.

"We were the best in the nation," he said. However, the plan was unsustainable, Hutchinson said, leading the city toward a "total train wreck fiscally."

"The revamped health care plan is totally fair," he said, "but it still upsets people."