Lakewood may layoff up to 50 workers

[Bryan Schwegler]

From the PD:
http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2008/02 ... to_50.html

As many as 50 Lakewood city employees -- including firefighters and Division of Aging workers -- could be laid off to offset a projected $3.2 million deficit, Mayor Edward FitzGerald said Wednesday.

FitzGerald, who became mayor last month, said the city's money woes have been at least a decade in the making. Costs, particularly employee health costs, have escalated while revenues have remained stagnant. Over the years, surplus funds have been depleted to make up the shortfall.

"The writing was on the wall . . . that we were going to hit the wall. There is no more money squirreled away anywhere," the mayor said during a meeting with the Plain Dealer editorial board.

The mayor said he hopes to reduce the number of layoffs by asking the city's unions for wage and benefit concessions. Almost all of the 524 full-time employees are covered by a union contract.

Capt. Dave Dargay, president of the firefighters union, said the union is willing to meet with the mayor. He added, "Any cuts would impact the service level."

Last year then-Mayor Tom George negotiated contracts with five unions. Employees received a 7 percent wage increase over three years.

"The contracts were not excessively generous, but they were in excess of what we could afford," FitzGerald said.

George said during his campaign last year that the city's finances were in good shape. He could not be reached for comment Wednesday.

Council President Michael Dever said council is ready to move forward with the mayor's plan. A budget must be approved by March 31.

FitzGerald also wants to transfer to existing social service agencies some services for senior citizens that are provided by the city and funded by the county.

The one department that will be unaffected by personnel cuts is the Police Department. Next month the mayor will unveil a law enforcement initiative targeting crimes, such as residential break-ins, which have been on the rise.

The city also is acquiring a dozen properties in foreclosure to help spur development projects such as office buildings.

[Phil Florian]

Wow, this is big stuff. What a start in office. Bold and decisive and hopefully it will help out. I feel really badly for those 50 that will be let go if wage concessions can't be reached. No word on how many can be saved by maybe some early retirements in the article. I wonder what the impact will be on services as seen by residents?

[Bill Call]

I want to commend the Mayor and council for taking this bold and necessary action. Hopefully the City unions will agree to reasonable concessions on their current labor contracts. I think the Mayor said it just right when he said the current contracts are not unreasonable but they are unaffordable. Real estate tax revenue and income tax revenue are likely to decline in future years. The City simply cannot afford business as usual.

I think the City now has a strong Mayor and City Council willing to take bold action to right a listing ship. We are lucky to have them. Hopefully, the people who actually live in the City will give them the support and respect they deserve.

[Jim O'Bryan]

I think the City now has a strong Mayor and City Council willing to take bold action to right a listing ship. We are lucky to have them. Hopefully, the people who actually live in the City will give them the support and respect they deserve.

Bill

I spent some time with the mayor speaking of many things. Staff technology, police, news, the Observer, and this latest news. It was obvious the layoffs and talk of layoffs was done with a heavy heart, after looking for ways not to lay off people.

The early rumors were 90 or more, that was cut nearly in-half. It was also clear more belt tightening is coming. But so are better days.

I too commend the mayor and council for being quick, decisive, and entirely open on this process.

Mayor FitzGerald is looking to fix a city not build a legacy.


.

[Bill Call]

I too commend the mayor and council for being quick, decisive, and entirely open on this process.

Mayor FitzGerald is looking to fix a city not build a legacy.

Mayors and City Council members have the most difficult jobs in politics. Any idiot can be a Senator or member of congress. They have no need to balance a budget and no ability to run an organization. They only thing they can run is their mouths.

I suppose eventually I might have some critisisms to make of our Mayor and Council but maybe not. They recognize the City has a $4 million dollar structural deficit and limited financial options. Overall, we have a very sober, competent group of talented people in charge of the City.

While I expect a miraculous effort I don't expect miracles.

Riddle: Why does it take $1.5 million in overtime to fight 144 fires?

[Jim O'Bryan]

Riddle: Why does it take $1.5 million in overtime to fight 144 fires?

Phone bank?


As far as miracles, we did not get here overnight, and will not get to where we need to go overnight.

I would hope residents understand that.


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[Will Brown]

After the west end debacle, I recall that George ran against Cain, somehow blaming her for the debacle and keeping quiet about his having been the head (if I recall) of city counsel.

Now we have a new major, who was head of city counsel (if I recall) who seems to feel that it was George who got us in this mess, and hopes we won't remember his part in it. Some things never change.

We tend to ascribe events to the executive branch, but in fact it is the legislative branch that approves, or disapproves, income and expense items.

So if we hope to see changes that will improve out situation, we need to get a stronger and more informed city counsel, and give them credit for what they do.

I've had good service from the fire department, and I would be reluctant to lose firefighters while keeping people at, for instance, the department of aging. We all age on our own, so why do we need a department of aging? Now if they had a department of getting younger, that would be a different story.

[Bryan Schwegler]

I don't recall either Cain or Fitzgerald being president of council. I don't even remember Cain being on council, but of course I was in high school at the time so maybe I missed it.

The only thing I find slightly intriguing in this is the fact that George hauled Fitzgerald in front of the elections commission for saying that we were headed into a fiscal crisis, but now it all turns out to be true.

So I just wonder, did George just completely not realize we were in this much trouble?

[Dee Martinez]

Now we have a new major, who was head of city counsel (if I recall) who seems to feel that it was George who got us in this mess, and hopes we won't remember his part in it. Some things never change.

Mr. Bob Seelie was president of city council until he left office in January. I believe he was council president for nearly 10 years. Mr. Tom George was never council president.

[Rick Uldricks]

deleted

[Dee Martinez]

http://www.lkwdpl.org/city/council.htm

http://www.lkwdpl.org/city/mayor.htm

This is an active page? Unbelievable. Its at leat 6 years old! Not a single council member pictured is still on council!!!
Point taken. Mr. Warren?

[Kenneth Warren]

Thanks for the heads up.

These are not active pages, of course. They stem from Mayor Cain's days when the library provided community webpage services for City Hall. They were taken down some time ago.

Since we archive our pages offline, it's possible a staff member accidentally uploaded the page, which was then indexed by a crawler.

These archived pages must have surfaced from a web search, because according to staff, these pages are not linked on the library page.

The pages are down.

Thank you again.

Kenneth Warren
Director
Lakewood Public Library

[Rick Uldricks]

deleted

[Kenneth Warren]

Rick:

It was a great post and image of a council past.

As we say in libraryland, "linking is thinking." Sometimes we have not finished thinking.

I appreciate the opportunity for mop-up.

Kenneth Warren
Director
Lakewood Public Library

[Kevin Butler]

The mayor has issued an email within the city on the subject, and I think it's informative:

I'm sure most of you have read recent media reports regarding our fiscal situation. I thought it might be helpful if you heard from me directly.

For the last several years, multi-million dollar deficits were projected for 2008. Along with other Councilmembers, I began advocating for taking strong action years ago on our looming deficit, not because I wanted to but because I feared that if we delayed, the situation would only get worse. Unfortunately, it has.

In December, at my suggestion, the City of Lakewood began discussions with the State Auditor's office regarding an emergency audit of our budget and operations. The first phase of that analysis is now complete, and the Auditors confirmed that our initial projections of a deficit in excess of $4 million in our general fund was accurate within 1.9%. It was important to arrive at an unbiased estimate of our deficit so that we could begin budget negotiations on common ground.

I have had direct, informal discussions with the bargaining units. In those discussions, I promised them that I would make all of our fiscal information available to them, and that I would seek to negotiate in good faith with them and not make any final decisions regarding layoffs until we had a chance to formally negotiate. I have kept that promise, and we will make no decisions on layoffs until negotiations or re-negotiations are complete.

Due to the magnitude of our deficit, I have instructed all directors to present options for reductions of both services and personnel. Many of those options, which include layoffs and outsourcing strategies, will probably not be implemented, depending on the outcome of labor negotiations. But I believe that the public expects us to exhaustively research all our options and strategies. No one should assume that because an option is being discussed or researched, it is a "done deal." We're simply putting all options on the table.

Of course, I cannot control media reports on this subject, so please take them with a grain of salt. I know that news reports will increase the anxiety of employees who are uncertain about their future employment. I wish I could be more definitive about the outcome of this process, but at this point all I can say is that the deficit is significant and some layoffs are likely. It is also my firm position that even in these difficult financial times, we must make some additional investments in the areas of public safety, technology and the foreclosure crisis. The timing of all of these simultaneous crises couldn't be worse, but those are the cards I have been dealt.

It's also important to note that even before negotiations have begun, we have unilaterally made many decisions to save money immediately. Approximately $2.5 million has been cut from the budget, primarily by not replacing vacant positions. Also, we are altering the health care benefits for non-bargaining unit employees, which also affects directors and myself personally. I apologize for not giving these affected employees more notice, but time is of the essence. Despite these cost saving measures, we still have a long way to go to balance the budget.

City of Lakewood employees do excellent work, and my preference would be to keep every one of them. Unfortunately, it has fallen to us to make unpopular decisions by March 31st. My hope is that we will come out of this process on firm financial ground and ready to make progress against all our challenges. Trying to avoid these decisions is just not an option- a bankrupt city does not provide any services at all, and the stakes are really that high.

I'm sorry that I couldn't be introduced to many of you under happier circumstances. We are working as hard as we can to resolve this situation, and I will continue to do that until we succeed. Your patience and support would be appreciated. Please feel free to circulate this memo to any employees who do not have access to email.

ed fitzgerald