GPD and LAPD Pay Comparison

This week, the City of Los Angeles officials reached a tentative one-year salary agreement
with the police officers’ union that avoids raises for most workers.  Under the terms of the deal, the vast
majority of officers would receive no bump in salary. It should be noted that
this agreement has not yet been ratified by union members. The City’s top
budget officer had urged lawmakers to hold off on raises as part of a larger
strategy to eliminate a structural budget deficit by 2018. (1)

Pay
increases would be given to nearly 1,000 officers who have joined the
department since 2009, the year salaries
for incoming officers were cut 20%. Lower pay for incoming officers
helped the city recover from the recession, but seriously hampered the LAPD’s
ability to recruit and retain young officers. The tentative agreement would
raise the salaries of its newer officers to the level of their better-paid
counterparts in the LAPD. Beginning in January, it would
hike starting salaries from $49,924 a year to $57,420, the source said.
(1)

 In comparison, the City of Glendale cut police salaries,
all grades only 2% between 10/8/2010 and 5/1/2012. Glendale’s Police Department
(GPD) incoming officers salary went from $76,932 to $75,396.

www.ci.glendale.ca.us/hr/pdf/Salary_Schedule_05-01-12.pdf

I attempted to extract the
number of Glendale police officers hired since 2009 as follows:

Number of Police Department
Salaried Positions

Based on Glendale’s adopted
budgets, it is inconclusive how many police officers were actually hired from
2007-08 to 2013-14 in conjunction with police officer retirements over the same
period.

<![if !supportLists]>·
<![endif]>It’s
apparent that the City of Glendale was paying its police officers (step 1) $25,472
more than the LAPD was paying its officers during the recession with no
substantial reduction for incoming officers. 

Based on the foregoing, I expanded my
analysis to see if the same was true with other Police Department
Classifications using the period October 2010 which both the GPD and the LAPD
had data information available.

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Over the
last five years, LAPD officers rack up hundreds of thousands of overtime hours,
only to have payment postponed years into the future. Deferred overtime hours must be paid when an officer retires, typically
at a much higher salary.  LAPD’s bank of unpaid overtime obligations has grown from $27 million
in 2007 to $122 million this year. Under the proposed contract, the city would substantially increase
overtime payments by $40 million. (1)

This
tentative agreement will allow the Police Chief to put hundreds more police
officers on the street to meet the needs of our city. LA’s City Administrative
Officer previously recommended that the council shift from its reliance on
unpaid overtime and return back to a “pay-as-you-go” system. With
more available officers, this would force hundreds of officers to take time off
each month in an effort to rein in the growth of unpaid overtime.  (1)

I
attempted to analyze the City of Glendale’s “unpaid overtime” obligations, if
any, from 2007 to current, to no avail. The City of Glendale records a
liability for its employees’ earned but unused accumulated vacation and
overtime in government wide and proprietary fund financial statements. The
unused accumulated vacation and overtime are expensed in the Employee Benefits
Fund, an Internal Service Fund, which incurs the liability. As of June 30, 2013, the total liability is
$13.056 million and the City has $8.283 million cash available in the Employee
Benefits Fund dedicated to this liability.

Based on the
preceding, it appears that the GPD pays a significant higher salary rate to its
rank and file doing similar police work, compared to the LAPD.  Although I calculated
approximately $5.978 million that GPD pays its rank and file in excess of what
LAPD pays, based on the maximum annual pay per classification, this did not
include any overtime at time and a half.
If I added an average of 15% in overtime across the board, this pay
difference would increase to $7.3 million.

The City of Glendale could easily save over $7 million
dollars annually if it contracted with the LAPD or at a minimum brought the
city’s GPD payroll in line with the LAPD.
How can the City Council justify this disparity?  Glendale isn’t even ranked in the 50 Safest
Cities in California. (2) No wonder city salaries, pensions and benefits are
out of control and unsustainable.

The City is facing deficits over the
next four to five years, and with rumors abound, possibly testing the water,
that Ochoa would like to lay off 40% of the city’s workforce by year end, he is
becoming more of a liability for the residents. Maybe the City would be better
off with another City Manager who is more open, transparent, with
unquestionable integrity. I don’t see any of these essential elements in
Ochoa.  There are no checks and balance
in place between the City Manager and the City Council.  That is the problem.  Ochoa has too much influence and control over
the city staff, the City Controller (non-elective position), internal audit
division, city reports, and the City Council who fails to do their homework and
due diligence before their weekly council meeting.

In the private sector, the majority
of job gains are in part time work.  Ever
since the recession, the majority of full time job offerings pay substantially
less income for similar type of work than pre- recession.  Many people still feel the recession has not
ended.   Unless and until the job market
improves substantially, and higher wages drive a convincing pickup in consumer
spending and demand, the lingering damage to confidence will likely keep the
weakest economic recovery in memory plodding along at a frustratingly slow pace. (3) 

The City’s employees shouldn’t be any
different than the private sector.  They
has not paid their fair share in wage concessions since the recession started
except giving up a few cost of living increases with zero inflation .  City employee unions are only interested in increasing
wage and benefits of its members to justify the annual $1,000 plus in union
dues that they receive from each city employee member. Unions could care less
about the health of the City’s economy or its solvency.  Therefore, it behooves the City Council to be
fiscally prudent over the next five to six years when it comes to future union
negotiations. 

The City Council should also not
forget about its CalPERS employer’s contributions that may increase by up to
50% over the next five years, or about $45 million, to contend with its $238
million unfunded pension debt obligations

 It would disingenuous if the City Council just
focused on increasing City revenues to pay for unsustainable city wages.  It needs to look at an alternative that
includes substantially reducing its expenditures.  Massive employee layoffs and/or threatening
to cut the community’s essential services are not a viable option.  This is a ploy that the public has zero
tolerance for, and the city officials would pay dearly for if they go down this
route. 

 If city employees had a choice between being
laid off and taking a salary reduction or working a reduced 32-35 hour
workweek, I’m certain that they would opt for the latter in lieu of being laid
off.  Just ask the people in the private
sector who were laid off and after their unemployment benefits stopped, after
two years of extensions, were only able to find part time work or completely
dropped out of the work force and no longer being counted in the unemployment
rolls. The unemployment rate is a complete farce as an indicator and should not
be relied upon.  The percentage of
American civilians 16 or older who do not have a job and are not actively
seeking one remained at a 36-year high in May 2014. The labor participation
rate, which is the percentage of Americans who are active in the workforce, is
at a 36 year low of 62.8%. It has not sunk this low since February 1978, when
Jimmy Carter was president. (4)  The
Glendale City Employees are blessed to have the job that they have.

Source Reference:

<![if !supportLists]>(1)
<![endif]>http://www.latimes.com/local/cityhall/la-me-0703-lapd-labor-deal-20140703-story.html

<![if !supportLists]>(2)
<![endif]>http://www.safewise.com/blog/50-safest-cities-california/

<![if !supportLists]>(3)
<![endif]>http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2014/01/01/cnbc-recovery-slowed-economy/4222929/

<![if !supportLists]>(4)
<![endif]>http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/ali-meyer/372-percentage-not-labor-force-remains-36-year-high