Weslaco negotiators tentatively agree on pay‑table changes, split over third‑year wage reopen

City negotiators and representatives of the police association in Weslaco spent a bargaining session narrowing differences over a proposed contract package, but the two sides remained divided over whether to include an automatic wage reopening in the third year.

A city staff member presenting the package said the deal would preserve a 32‑hour leave buyback and would reallocate about 2.13 percent of the package toward a stability pay pool, yielding a roughly 13.8 percent aggregate increase across the table. The presenter showed a table that spread a $125,000 stability allocation across years and noted an end‑of‑March figure of about $125,817.

The mayor emphasized public safety and recruitment as priorities. "Public safety is what we prioritize because that's like 54% of our budget," the mayor said, urging solutions that avoid raising taxes and backing a proposal to add a cadet position and partner with the Rio Grande Development Council to create an academy for new recruits.

The police association identified four articles still under discussion: the contract term (Article 5), the base pay table (Article 18.1), the seniority pay table (Article 18.3) and the leave buyback (Article 20, subsection 6). "Everything else is gonna stay the same," the association representative said, and the group indicated it could conceptually tentatively agree (TA) to the base pay table and the buyback.

Parties discussed technical drafting points for the cadet position, including whether the cadet should appear in the pay table and how non‑pay progression would work. The chief noted the cadet track involves non‑pay elements such as automatic progression versus testing into the true entry rank, and negotiators agreed those drafting details could be resolved later.

Bargainers also debated smoothing anomalies in later years of the pay table (referred to in the discussion as year '19 and above). Negotiators estimated only a handful of officers would be affected — roughly six to seven — and discussed the per‑person and aggregate cost implications of equalizing those steps.

The most significant remaining disagreement centered on whether to include an automatic reopen on base wages in the third year. City staff described the proposal as an "automatic reopen on wages in the third year" with a floor of 3.5 percent; the association said it had "serious doubts" it could persuade membership to accept that third year as written. "We have serious doubts that we're gonna be able to sell the third year to the membership," the association representative said.

The association proposed an alternative: treat the missed increase since a prior impasse as a one‑time bonus rather than a retroactive wage increase. City representatives warned that paying retroactively is constrained by legal limits but suggested the same economic effect could possibly be achieved by paying an amount in the current fiscal year rather than labeling it a retroactive raise. "I know what the legal argument is gonna be… we're constitutionally prohibited from providing anything retroactive," the chief said, adding the city could structure a payment as current‑year pay instead.

Negotiators also discussed a targeted graveyard differential that would apply to officers on that shift; the association said only a small number would qualify, while the city noted it had already added stability payments for 15 officers at an approximate additional cost of $14,000 and asked the union to weigh the distributional effects.

The parties agreed to caucus briefly to confirm headcount and cost calculations and scheduled a follow‑up bargaining session for May 28 to continue talks and, if needed, finalize an extension agreement. No formal votes were taken at the meeting.

Next steps: staff will reconvene with the association to revisit year‑three language, confirm the final pay‑table numbers and return with any required legal clarifications on how a one‑time payment could be structured within fiscal rules.