Human Resources describes labor concessions, upcoming bargaining and staffing pressures

The Department of Human Resources briefed supervisors on the status of labor contracts and the city’s bargaining landscape, describing a recent set of one‑time and temporary concessions and previewing a large round of contract reopenings next year.

Mickey Callahan, Human Resources Director, and Martin Grand of the employee relations division said the city has roughly 26,000 budgeted employees represented across dozens of bargaining units. Grand summarized an historic two‑year concession agreement brokered with the San Francisco Labor Council and multiple unions that yielded about $235,000,000 in savings through furlough days, deferred raises and targeted health‑plan reforms.

Callahan and Grand said most concessions are time‑limited and that only a small share (about $3,000,000) of the two‑year savings is ongoing. They described mechanisms such as binding interest arbitration that have been used in past rounds and noted that police and fire pay has been adjusted toward market parity in recent years.

Supervisors pressed DHR for details on safety staffing, asking for breakdowns of the police FTE counts (active vs. light duty and other categories), the effect of the Deferred Retirement Option Program (DROP) and the department’s plans for recruitment and academies. DHR said an analysis of DROP would be presented to the Board on April 15 and agreed to provide more granular breakout data for safety groups and light‑duty counts.

The department also described its market‑survey approach used for classification and compensation comparisons (Bay Area jurisdictions), ongoing classification consolidation work and efforts to find efficiencies in salary setting and premiums during the upcoming bargaining cycle. The committee indicated it will follow up with DHR and bring public safety departments in for detailed budget and staffing discussions.