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Some Long Beach Employees Help Ease City's Financial Crisis by Ryan ZumMallen | Archive | 09.02.10 |
+ 4:15pm | The City of Long Beach may have scored a break in its ongoing budget crisis this week, when yesterday the offices of the City Attorney, City Prosecutor and City Auditor announced that they will agree to a plan that eases the strain on Long Beach's $18.5 million deficit that must be balanced by September 15. Employees in those three offices will take scheduled salary increases and apply them to pension costs in order to relieve the City of Long Beach from their responsibility to pay that money. The strategy was one of the ideas put forth by Mayor Bob Foster and City Manager Pat West to ease high pension costs in a troubled financial period for the city. The City Council must approve the decision before it is implemented. “The nationwide financial crisis has created new challenges for Long Beach,” City Attorney Bob Shannon said in a press release. “We appreciate and accept the Mayor’s tough but necessary recommendations, and we look forward to working with him and with the City Council in an effort to resolve these challenges, while providing the best services possible for the citizens of Long Beach.” Employees in those departments also agreed to reduce retirement benefits for new employees, calculating benefits based on the employee's highest three years of salary rather than the highest one year of salary earned. “We believe that cooperation from the City’s public employee unions is critical to help avoid significant reductions in service and prevent further layoffs," City Auditor Laura Doud said in a statement. "With teamwork, Long Beach will remain on course to not only survive these difficult times over the next few years, but to thrive as a vibrant city well into the future.” While a temporary victory for the city, perhaps even with long-term solutions, this move in itself with not solve Long Beach's drastic budget issues. The mayor must present a balanced budget to the City Council by September 15 and there are still millions more that must be found.
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9 Comments so far.
PKG Let's just see it the mighty unions agree to forgo their raises. Come on LB Employees - get with the picture - people are losing their jobs, not getting raises, and you believe you are exempt! Let the layoffs begin. CHARLIE Now this kind of action shows there might be hope for our City after all... Dragonflyqueen Long Beach is in crisis financially...Everyday there are stories in the news about some kind of budget cut (water no longer being tested for safety etc.), lay offs, programs eliminated....We have over 574 city employees making OVER $100,00....hmmm...what's wrong w/ this picture? Make history City of Long Beach ! don't be like all the other cities in Ca. basically financially 'raping' the state (translation--the people)....But of course that will NEVER happen....what is mentioned in the story above is NOT enough----why should the people (who pay the salaries and support the city) suffer? what's coming in November is not just about voting out those who have 'betrayed' us....it's about a new awareness and change all across the country....So get ahead of the game Long Beach and make positive headlines and set an example for the whole state and the whole country.... Ron Wow if I good only get a job with the city of LB, union or non-union I would have no problem having my salary increases going towards pension costs. When you've been out of work as long as I have you'd undrstand Jon If only the majority of LB employees would stand up against their unions and vote in union leaders that will make similar organization wide concessions everyone would be a lot better off. If all the city officials, administrators, teachers, police officers, and firefighters took only a 5-7% reduction in compensation (including pensions) the city could actually hire more of their colleagues, or at the very least not fire them. Maybe it could even go toward decreasing the pay discrepancies between the highest and lowest paid city employees. The difference in pay between a fire engineer and a paramedic for example is alarming, and completely unfair. Marilyn Folks, these employees didn't create the problems so stop taking your frustration out on them. I say "Thanks!" No Good They still get credit for the $ on their pensions don't they? This just kicks the can down the road. I'd like to see 10% pay cuts for all city employees--It's not even as high as the city's unemployment rate! This is more phony business. Fisch I'll agree that public employees should be responsible for more of their pensions, especially when they are defined benefit pensions, but I get really tired of people making a big deal about $100,000 salaries. It's not 1990, people! Today, $100,000 is a moderate income for a family of 4-5. I make $100,000 and yet, I can't afford a house in 75% of Long Beach, and I'm single! And the 25% of Long Beach that I could afford a house in, I wouldn't want to live in anyway. Good start but where is the LBPOA? The LBPOA is the sole source of the problem. If the LBPOA did the same thing, this crisis would be over.
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LBPOST.com Managing Editor Ryan ZumMallen keeps up on all the current and breaking Long Beach news.
Ryan ZumMallen has served as the managing editor of the LBPOST.com since 2007. He graduated from CSULB with a degree in Print Journalism in 2008 and is a member of the 2009 class of Leadership Long Beach. You can find him on various basketball courts around the city.
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