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City presents proposed MOU with Police Officers Association; package includes multi-year pay gains, overtime changes and housing incentives
Summary
City human resources staff summarized a tentative memorandum of understanding with the San Francisco Police Officers Association that would raise base wages roughly 23% over four years, shift some pay into the base, change overtime calculations to reduce costs, and create a housing assistance forgivable-loan program for officers. The MOU is filed with the Board of Supervisors and will be reviewed in committee.
Micky Callahan, the city's employer relations director in the Department of Human Resources, told the Police Commission the recently concluded memorandum of understanding with the San Francisco Police Officers Association includes a "good wage package" totaling "about 23% over 4 years," with a larger increase to starting pay to help recruitment. Callahan said the city offset much of the cost through operational changes and estimated controller'office savings in the first year of about $7,000,000.
The agreement would alter how overtime is calculated by excluding sick pay, compensatory time and floating holidays from the overtime base, a change Callahan said would yield roughly $700,000 in savings by preventing sick leave from being treated as hours worked for overtime. The MOU also reduces an existing sick'leave cash'out wellness program to its prior contract level (about a $2,000,000 saving), caps maximum compensatory time at 300 hours over three years and removes overtime eligibility for captains while giving them an additional roughly 8% pay increase to compensate.
Callahan described other terms: expanded substance'abuse testing, moving commanders and deputy chiefs into separate management bargaining units, a rotation policy for officers hired after Jan. 1, 2007, and a housing program administered by the Mayor's Office of Housing that offers forgivable loans to help officers buy or rent within the city. He said the MOU has been filed with the Board of Supervisors and will go to committee next week while the union remains engaged in its internal voting process.
Commissioners asked for further details. Commissioner Joe Veronese expressed support for higher pay but said he opposed routine officer rotations on community policing grounds and questioned whether the 60% paid release time for the POA president would be enforceable in practice. Commissioner Yvonne Lee asked whether bilingual pay rates were comparable to other major cities; Callahan said staff would survey local contracts and report back. On the fiscal effect, Callahan said the controller and budget analysts were finalizing estimates and that the MOU hearing before the government audits committee is scheduled for next Monday.
Public comment was mixed. SEIU representative Frank Martin Del Campo praised changes to overtime calculations but urged the commission to address ongoing equity concerns about sworn officers performing civilian jobs and the treatment of injured workers. Another member of the public criticized the $25,000 forgivable'loan housing incentive as an inappropriate inducement.
The presentation was a status report; the commission did not take final action on the MOU at this meeting. The Board of Supervisors and its committee review remain the next steps.
