Portsmouth councilors asked for $890K more for 'robust' raises in police, fire contracts

PORTSMOUTH — The City Council will hold a public hearing Tuesday night on a proposal to allocate $890,000 to help pay for the increased cost of five tentative police and fire union contracts city administrators have negotiated.

City Finance Director Judie Belanger calculated the increased cost of the first year of the agreement at more than $1.4 million, according to City Manager Karen Conard, in a memo to the City Council.

The amount included in the city's fiscal year 2024 municipal budget for increased contract costs fell short of the actual costs. Conard is seeking to use $890,000 from the city's unassigned fund balance to make up the difference.

A significant increase

Asked why there was a nearly $900,000 difference between what was budgeted and the actual cost of the contract increases, Mayor Deaglan McEachern said it was part of the negotiation process.

“We’re not going to lay our cards on the table during negotiations,” he said. “We might not have got the contracts we did.”

He noted that because the money is being proposed to come from the unassigned fund balance, it will not increase the tax rate.

McEachern stated that the contracts represent “a significant increase” in pay for the city employees.

Five new contracts

The City Council at Tuesday’s meeting is slated to vote on a second reading of the $890,000 allocation.

The council is also being asked by Conard to approve all five of the union contracts, which include the firefighters, fire officers, police patrolmen’s, police ranking officers and police civilian employees’ associations.

There are more than 70 pages of documents in the City Council packet related to the tentative contract agreements between the city and the unions.

McEachern acknowledged it may be difficult for some residents to understand exactly what they represent because of the number of documents, some of which he acknowledged are “somewhat inaccessible.”

That’s why, McEachern said, city labor attorney Thomas Closson will be making a presentation to the council before Tuesday’s public hearing, to better explain the details of the contracts.

“Our job is to make the union contracts more understandable for both the council and the public,” McEachern said Friday.

Once-in-a-generation market

In a memo to the council and Conard, Closson stated he and the negotiating team “all recognize that these (tentative agreements) are expensive, particularly in comparison to prior (collective bargaining agreements) that the city has negotiated with these same unions.”

“However, we agree that the (agreements) are necessary for the city's police department and the city's fire department to attract and to retain top talent in a uniquely competitive, once­-in-a-generation market for quality public safety personnel,” Closson said.

The two fire department contracts — which each run for three years — include what Closson described as “robust but competitive compensation increases in year I, followed by more modest compensation increases in year 2 and year 3.”

Both contracts also call for implementing “new, expanded wage schedules that will make future contractual wage adjustments more steady and more predictable for the city.”

The contracts include increases in the health insurance splits that will result in both fire associations paying 18% while the city pays 82%, Closson wrote.

Details on pay for police, paramedics, EMTs

The contracts for three police associations are all four years, Closson wrote.

The three contracts also include “robust but competitive compensation increases in year 1, followed by more modest increases in year 2, year 3, and year 4,” Closson stated, along with the switch to the 82/18 insurance split.

The contracts for the police officer’s and police civilian associations “provide management with increased flexibility in slotting transfers from other departments onto the new wage schedules, significantly aiding recruiting efforts,” he wrote.

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“Finally, all three police department (tentative agreements) include comprehensive language governing the implementation of body-worn cameras and in-car video for all relevant personnel,” Closson said.

Other information about the tentative agreements reached with fire and police unions are detailed in city documents. Here are some highlights:

• The Fire Department associations will be receiving cost-of-living adjustments (COLAs) of 2% in fiscal years 2025 and 2026.

• The police associations will receive COLA increases of between 2% to 5% in fiscal years 2025, 2026 and 2027.

• The new wage schedule for firefighters calls for Step 1 starting pay for EMTs to be $54,000 a year and $58,320 for paramedics.

• The new starting salary for patrolmen under the tentative contract agreement is $60,000 per year.

Services people expect to receive

McEachern stressed the crucial role city employees who work in the police and fire departments play in serving the residents and protecting Portsmouth’s quality of life.

“We’re negotiating in an intense labor market and police and fire personnel continue to provide the services people expect to have in the city of Portsmouth,” McEachern said.

The salaries the city is proposing to pay to the police and fire association members “has to be competitive with other municipalities,” McEachern said, because “some of those municipalities are providing more money for those positions than they historically have.”

Tuesday’s council meeting is scheduled to start at 7 p.m. and will be held in City Council chambers in City Hall.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Portsmouth NH councilors to vote on $890K for police, fire contracts