Voters will decide on police, firefighters union
By Rachel Carter
Longmont Times-Call
LONGMONT — Voters will decide in November whether to allow police and fire department employees to unionize.
The Longmont City Council took a final vote Tuesday night to put a charter amendment on November’s ballot that would allow police and fire employees to form a collective bargaining unit. The council voted 4-3, with Mayor Roger Lange and council members Mary Blue and Gabe Santos opposing.
The amendment to the city’s charter — if voters pass it — would require the city to negotiate pay, benefits and hours with its sworn police officers and firefighters, as well as community service officers, technicians and dispatchers.
Under the proposed amendment, police and fire employees would not be allowed to strike or participate in a work stoppage or slowdown, and the union would not negotiate its first contract with the city until 2010.
“It is essential we have a formal voice in our working conditions,” Dan DiTiro, president of the Longmont Professional Firefighters’ Association, told the council. “We fight for change, for better, safer working conditions, as well as providing a higher level of service to the community.”
But the proposed charter amendment that voters will see is much different than the original proposal the Longmont Fraternal Order of Police and the Longmont Professional Firefighters’ Association brought to the council last month.
After meeting with city leaders, the groups dropped third-party binding arbitration from the amendment and struck a section that city officials said would limit their ability to manage.
Instead of binding arbitration, if the union and the city could not reach an agreement on a labor contract, an outside mediator would hold hearings and make recommendations to both sides. If both sides still couldn’t agree, then voters would resolve the issue in an election.
As for striking the section about management rights, the groups agreed that both the police chief and fire chief need the flexibility to run their respective departments.
DiTiro said the compromises address the concerns of council members, city officials and both the police and fire chief.
Those changes show that both FOP and LPFA leaders are willing and able to work with city leaders, Stephen Schulz, president of the Fraternal Order of Police, said.
Councilwoman Karen Benker thanked everyone working together to hash out some of sticking points, saying, “I know there was great compromise on both sides.”
But the changes and compromises didn’t sway Lange, Blue and Santos. The council members, who opposed the issue on the council’s initial vote Aug. 12, said they still don’t see a need for a union.
Longmont’s pay, benefits and working conditions are comparable to — if not better than — other Colorado departments, Lange said.
“The question for me is why are we doing this, and why do we need to do this now?” he said, adding later, “My point is that if there is no problem, why are we changing anything?”
Both Schulz and DiTiro said the police and fire group leaders will work together in the next few weeks to discuss their campaign plans.
