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This is the 5 th
month of my term
as the President of the FWPOA. It seems like the 5th
year with all the
things going on around here. Long days, long hours, and even longer
minutes. We are bargaining contracts, doing pay surveys, attending
City Council meetings, meeting with the Interim Chief, meeting with
the Mayor, meeting with the City Manager, meeting with City Council
Members, attending meetings about meetings, and putting out rumors.
For this article let me concentrate on the first and last issues,
the bargaining process and rumor control.
The Bargaining Process
We
are making progress; it may be slow at times, but progress none the
less. We would rather take our time and insure that the first
contract is solid instead of rushing through it for the sake of just
having a contract. The first contract will be the foundation that
all future contracts will be built upon so it must be correct.
There are two different styles of bargaining. The first is called
Positional Based Bargaining. In Positional Based Bargaining, both
sides try to bargain from a secure position and do not "show their
cards" to the other side in hopes that the other side will make a
mistake so that they can capitalize on the error or over sight. An
example of Positional Based Bargaining is where one side offers 100
and the other offers 50 and both sides eventually meet in the middle
at 75. Due to the adversarial dynamics of Positional Based
Bargaining, it is usually aggressive and not very friendly and thus
is not always the best format for bargaining.
The second style of bargaining is called Interest Based Bargaining.
In Interest Based Bargaining, both sides try to determine what the
common goal is and then work together to move toward it. An example
of a common goal is the recruitment and retention of the best and
the brightest police officers that are available. We want to recruit
and retain the best and the brightest, and so does the city. The
question is how do we get there? We feel that the best way to attain
this goal is by insuring that our pay and benefits are competitive
in our market. The city would agree, but they are also concerned
that they may be unable to afford to bring our salaries and benefits
up to competitive levels without affecting other employee groups and
city services. We would then have to gently, but firmly, remind the
city that no other employee group has a CCPD that brings in almost
50 million dollars per year in order to insure that the employees of
the Police Department are paid competitively and at proper staffing
levels to create a safer environment for the citizens of Fort Worth.
As you can see, Interest Based Bargaining does not have to be
adversarial and is usually more productive.
I
have had a few people ask me why the bargaining team is made up of
board members only (except for the lead negotiator who is Ron DeLord
the Executive Director of CLEAT). That is simple, the Board of
Directors were elected by you, the membership, to run the Fort Worth
Police Officers Association and they have been empowered by you
through your vote to make decisions with the best interest of the
membership in mind. Just because the Board of Directors is guiding
the bargaining process, does not mean that you, as a member of the
POA do not have a voice in the process. In the end, the person that
has the final say on whether we sign the contract or not is you. You
will make this choice during the ratification portion of the
process. Every member of the POA will be afforded the opportunity to
vote on the finished product. You, as a member of the POA, will have
the final say on our side. The City Council will have the final say
on the city’s side. A final contract will not be signed until the
voting population, on both sides, agree.
Rumor Control
Captains. Need I say more. Yes, the
city did put on the table that they would like to have the ability
to appoint Captains instead of having the rank of Captain as a civil
service tested position. The reasoning that the city gave for this
request was for "Loyalty". The civil service rank of Captain is not
something that we will easily or willingly give up, but since the
city has felt the need to place it on the table for discussion then
it will be discussed. As I stated above, you, the member of the POA
and thus the voter with the final say, have the choice to vote "NO"
on any contract that you see fit.
The FWPOA hosted a luncheon for the
Captains in order to find out their position on the subject. Eight
of the thirteen Captains showed up to the luncheon and the other
five had valid reasons why they could not be in attendance.
Surprisingly enough, the Captains all agreed that it would be a bad
idea for the city to have the ability to appoint captains.
Recently, I have had many inquiries
into the Hawk phone plan and the bills that are being sent out. I
have even seen some very opinionated MDC messages on the subject.
Let me address a few issues. Hawk is not trying to get out of the
contract that they have been in with the POA for about 12 years now.
If Hawk wanted out of the contract, they would just not renew it.
What they are doing is attempting to
properly bill phone customers for their usage. Some customers are
using their phones in a manner that is inconsistent with the plan
that they signed up for. An example would be 411 information calls.
Even after Hawk and the POA sent out letters to all customers that
they would begin charging for 411 calls over a year ago, there are
still customers that use 411 and accrue charges in the hundreds of
dollars. The same goes for internet users. Hawk offers plans for
more internet usage but some customers have not taken advantage of
it and thus rack up big bills instead. There are also customers that
have gotten phones for their dependants and fail to properly monitor
the usage. We have over 1600 phones with Hawk and are one of their
biggest customers. They have no desire to end that relationship, but
at the same time they have to charge customers for the services that
are used because Hawk gets charged for the usage. Remember, Hawk is
a reseller of ATT services, it is not like they are just charging
people for the sake of making a buck. They have to pay for the
services that they resell to you as the customer. In addition,
the MDC is sometimes not the best place to air opinions, especially
when you don’t have all the facts. If you are concerned about the
Hawk contract or the bills that are being received, feel free to
contact me at the POA office or (817)614-5031 or talk to Shaunie
Smith at the Camp Bowie Hawk location. You may also contact any of
the Board of Directors that may work in your area of town as well.
As always, take care of yourself and
take care of each other.
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