Check back here later for a bargaining update. We will address the article in today's paper and speak to the real issue - the city's intent to send tax money out of Austin instead of hiring firefighters.

Click here to see a video excerpt from bargaining. More to come.

Click here for a good article from The Austin Chronicle.

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Previous updates

July 31st

This week's bargaining sessions were lively. We signed off on one more tentative agreement concerning union dues, etc. We also discussed the civil service commission, promotions, appointments, and pay.

We offered a counter proposal to both the City’s economic package and their promotional concept.

We clarified with the City team that Austin Firefighters have never bargained for or received the so called "public safety premium." This fictional pay category was created by the former city manager as a sound bite for the press.

Each and every wage adjustment received by Austin Firefighters has been bargained for at arm’s length by Local 975. Several years ago, city management attempted to force public safety employees to take a flat 2% wage increase with little or no negotiation. She labeled this the "public safety premium." This offer was rejected by Local 975 as well as the other public safety agencies.

Approximately five years ago, Austin Firefighters reaffirmed our commitment to serve the citizens of Austin and gave up an offered pay increase to keep fire stations open and maintain funding for city health and human services. The city manager told the press that firefighters had rejected the "public safety premium."

The citizens of Austin recognized the difficulty Austin Firefighters were having in getting the city to bargain in good faith and so, by referendum, voted overwhelmingly to grant us the right to bargain collectively.

Unfortunately, the “public safety premium” catch phrase continues to be used to push an anti-union agenda. We felt it necessary to clarify that we will not participate in that campaign.

We had the opportunity to express frustration with the promotional processes experienced during the current contract. We expect more conversation about this subject.

Finally, we had a very brief opportunity to discuss the outsourcing of our civil service jobs through contracts. We were disappointed in the dismissive response from the city, but remain optimistic that we can productively address this issue at the table.

The City has also expressed it’s strong desire for a random drug testing policy. Next week we expect to see their proposal for such a policy.

We meet again on August 4^th. We will not be meeting August 5th.

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July 21st

There are no bargaining sessions this week as City Management presents its budget proposal to council this Thursday.

Last week we met with the management team. We heard some of their ideas for changes to the work cycle (not shift change) and some economic proposals. No great progress was made, but we expect deeper discussion next week.

More updates will be added when we have more information.

As always, if you have and specific questions about bargaining please contact your VP.

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Monday was a short bargaining day. Most of the City's team had a meeting at city hall in the morning so we didn't start until 2pm. The city offered their proposals for hiring and training on Tuesday, and we suggested three more articles that don't require significant changes which we feel could be tenatively agreed to soon. We will continue to study the City's proposed changes to the hiring and cadet manual proceedures.

Future bargaining dates set so far are: July 28 and 28, August 4, 18 and 25 with tenative additional dates on August 5th and/ or 19th.