PD Editorial: Santa Rosa contract is a step but toward what?

The Santa Rosa City Council had some good reasons for approving new three-year contracts with the city’s 165 police officers and public safety managers Tuesday.

First, the deal will give officers their first net pay increase since 2008. Second, the raises - excluding pay boosts to make up for employees’ increased contributions to retirement benefits - are relatively modest, just 1.8 percent a year.

Third, at the end of this deal, officers will be contributing 13 percent of their salaries toward their pensions. Three years ago they were contributing nothing. This is certainly progress.

But there was one major reason for rejecting, or at least delaying, approval of this deal until more financial analysis was available. That is that the city has no real idea what impact this agreement will have on Santa Rosa’s finances and city services over the next three years and the years to come.

That should have been the prevailing concern. Unfortunately, it wasn’t.

If anything, the council, on a 4-1 vote, moved ahead with the understanding that this deal will possibly, if not likely, have Santa Rosa facing a budget deficit within year two of the contract.

What was the rush for approval? This contact was made public just a few days before it was approved.

Yes, the deal includes some concessions by police. But they don’t come free.

Officers and managers will see their pay increase 9.5 percent over three years. In exchange, employees will agree to contribute 4 percent more toward their own pensions, meaning the net increase will be 5.5 percent.

Having employees contribute more toward their retirements will save the city money in the long run. By year three, the city will be paying 32 percent of salaries into the California Public Employees Retirement System accounts instead of 36 percent.

But the short-term costs are real. The contract is projected to cost nearly $5 million between now and 2017, with unknown costs after that. In addition, the 9.5 percent pay increase means higher base salaries for employees when they retire, which means higher long-term costs for the city as well.

So how does this all fit in the city’s big picture? It’s not clear.

The last the public heard, the city was behind some $252 million in meeting its longterm obligations to retirees. In addition, it was bracing for hefty increases to come in what it owes Cal-PERS to make up for market losses suffered during the recent downturn in the economy.

The council also moved ahead without analysis of what impact this would have on the city’s dependence on its two key tax measures, P, which is due to expire in five years, and O, due to sunset in 11, and what this would leave for other departments and employee groups .

While police officers have gone without net pay increases in recent years, they have not exactly seen their compensation stagnate as much as those in the private sector. Total Santa Rosa police salary and benefits, between 2005 and 2013, grew 22.5 percent. And that was before the 9.5 percent boost from this deal.

There’s no question that Santa Rosans value their police. But Councilman Gary Wysocky, the lone vote in opposition, was right when he said that this new deal is “tying the hands of future councils. It’s not fair to the next generation. I don’t think it’s going to be fair to the current employees.”

It’s not. And it deserved more vetting before it was approved.