where is the release?

What a great way to start negotiations, spend $350,000 on some high priced accountants from Toronto to conduct the most expensive “study” in the city’s history that not surprisingly given the mayor was overseeing the work, says union wages are too high and that the city should contract out more than it already does.

Now she says in a release “we anticipate that collective bargaining could be challenging unless there is recognition of the complex and competing needs facing the City.”

So is the mayor saying her staff don’t already recognize the complex and competing needs facing the city? You would think if anybody knows it would be her staff.

IMO, despite the mayors public shot across the bow, staff know well as a number of their co-workers got walking papers last year.

Perhaps it is mayor and council who don’t recognize the challenges as they were the ones who voted themselves a massive pay hike and then went on a political junket to China while telling everyone else to tighten the belt.

Is the mayor going to be like Gary Bettman and do all the negotiating through the media? This will be entertaining.

Maybe the civic workers could start an idle no more movement:D

Apparently some workers were laid of last year, however there were a number of jobs that just wernt filled, so in effect the actual layoffs did not amount to much. Anyone have an actual number. I heard that some of them that left still work for the City under contract. I wonder if in fact that is true????

Who will do the hard nose negotiating for the City. Do we have anyone that can hold the line on expenses??? Who sits at the table???

Lol, wow.. a bit hypocritical? Did they not give themselves a 30% raise followed by a cost of living increase on top of that (after the 30% was added of course).
“we anticipate that collective bargaining could be challenging unless there is recognition of the complex and competing needs facing the City.”
Does this mean that mayor and council had no recognigition of these needs prior to their huge increase?

Zero increase. period.

Lol, wow.. a bit hypocritical? Did they not give themselves a 30% raise followed by a cost of living increase on top of that (after the 30% was added of course).
“we anticipate that collective bargaining could be challenging unless there is recognition of the complex and competing needs facing the City.”
Does this mean that mayor and council had no recognigition of these needs prior to their huge increase?

Hmmm, I did not post that twice.

Hmmm, I did not post that twice.

This sounds like the perfect time to start trimming the work force.

dow7500, I agree completely. I have said it many times and will again…City staff are making way too much on our tax dollars.

The City needs to look at what others are paid in the various positions. When clerical, janitoral and cashiers make $10 more per hour than the private sector, there is something wrong with that.

And what about those same people working in places like the mills? That’s private,do they not make good money? I wonder how many mill workers would agree to take a $10/hour cut like you suggest bornandbred.

And what about those same people working in places like the mills? That’s private,do they not make good money? I wonder how many mill workers would agree to take a $10/hour cut like you suggest bornandbred.

“And what about those same people working in places like the mills?”

I’m not seeing the connection between the city and the mills. Please explain.

And what about those same people working in places like the mills? That’s private,do they not make good money? I wonder how many mill workers would agree to take a $10/hour cut like you suggest bornandbred.

fin-frustrated – if you hit refresh without leaving the page it posts your comment again. Just back out to home first and you are good ;)

I also would like to hear the logic behind financially_frustrated’s comment.

“The City needs to look at what others are paid in the various positions.” People who work in the mills, and other industrial places, for the railway, any Union job, make good wages. Should they all take a $10 decrease in pay so everyone makes the same wage?

Like any beuracracy, inefficiencies are developed by neglecting the fact that some workers are doing redundant work that can be done with advancing technology.

Every department needs to identify critical work and marginal work. Every department will likely loose about 5-8% of the work force due to retirement or people quitting. Thus replace it with 3-4% new employees. People with the highest skill sets advances. Maintain critical work and keep up when one can on marginal duties. This means review of what the department does, and find ways to reduce redundancy, it may not be much, but saving 20 hrs of work a week out of a department is huge bucks. Is it really neccessary to have a weekly departmental meeting.

There still will be workers who refuse new education to improve themselves, this can be easily resolved by redefining clerk levels in relation to pay. if they do not get the hint that way, they probably does not deserve to be employed by a progress employer like the city.

Should the city workers get a raise, yes something reflective to what is going on.

Do we have too many inside workers, Yes.

Should city workers doing the same job as a person in the private sector get paid more. No, the rule of thumb use to be the workers in public office gets about 90% of the wage that a person in the private sector would get paid.

Lets some get paid more than the private or on par or more. Now about the private sector getting paid less the difference goes into the owners pocket. I know of many examples.

Why not pay them by using the same system that council did when they voted in thier own increase ? good for the goose etc. Look at the same cities they did when making thier wage comparison and take the the highest.

As for all you with your $10 and hour statements why do I see nothing but jealously? Wrong life choices maybe ? Why so upset about what others make ? Do you hate anyone that makes more than $10 an hr. Union done you wrong ? Spend 4 years in college to make 50K a year ?

You must remember with our “free medical” its the higher wage earners that pay a higher tax to help with the costs. So they should all be paid $10 and hour? look at the state of our medical system now.. cut more from it and then see how bad it could get.

Lets get all the guys working up in Fort Mcmurray cut back to $10 and see who will work there? As mentioned earlier, if everyone makes $10 then the only winner is the companies who will make even more off their workers backs.. gee… how about $5 an hour across the board.

Wow, so many comments on this media release. Do we really know how much was spent on the Core Review???? Or the the China trip.
Sounds like the Green is shoveling her own snow (SH..) and not off the ground and giving it to the City Employees and the Tax payers. Wonder if she is giving any of that back to her big time spenders who supported her 85 grand campaign.
Will she be on the City’s bargaining committee or has she hand picked her own for this, like the Select Committee????
Come on Green be honest for once in your life…man up for what you have done to our City and its hard earned paying workers.
She’s not the one who takes the verbal abuse on the phone or out there while they are working outside. And can those people tell the public who don’t think that they are doing their jobs to F…off NO. But I’m sure they would like to, and to others.
Hope they get everything they ask for.

“…its hard earned paying workers.”

all two of them? :)

In all seriousness, there are way too many people employed by various levels of government. It’s time we trimmed the civil service back to a manageable level; ie a level that we can afford. The city pays over 47 million dollars in salaries! That’s insane. Municipal governments are the most fiscally irresponsible bureaucracy out there. It’s time to reel them in. A good place to start is with the work force.

There are about 30 Managers at City Hall. I beleive that the lowest paid ones get approx $105,000.00 per year and it goes up from there.

There is no doubt that the City staff, and inside, outside, employee’s have grown over the years, and that there has to be some downsizing, and some **hold the line** on wages.

The same applies to all other jobs Government or Industry. We cannot just keep increasing wages and benefits. Especially when we have thousands of people on fixed incomes who cannot afford to keep paying the higher cost of goods and services, when they do not get an increase in wages.

All levels of Government, Federal, Provincial, Municipal, Regional, and all Government entities, are out of control when it comes to spending tax dollars. They are all well entrenched in the culture of entitlement, and actually think that they are worth the money that they get paid. This is understandable, however just because that thinking is understandable, doesnt make it right.

I have little faith in the ability of the Governments, thier employee’s, or anyone in private business being able to solve these problems. We will just continue on our stupid ways until we have a big crash, and then the chickens will come home to roost.

It doesn’t matter where a person works we could always say take a pay cut and sell your product cheaper. Most of the outside workers could go work at a mine for $30000 a year more than they make at the city. If they start cut wages then there will be vacancies for everyone that wants to work for $10 less.

“I have little faith in the ability of the Governments, thier employee’s, or anyone in private business being able to solve these problems”

So I guess we’re relying on retirees or those in the not for profit sectors to fix everything?

The policy is one of pay cuts for the workers so that administration and executives in management can get the raises.

Its the same policy in the public and private sectors.

Axman….use it on yourself. Or use it to shove your driveway after the graders and loaders come by after plowing.
Give them outside/inside workers all raises fire some top management. Way too many o them.

The average worker is lucky if wages keep up with inflation. It has been this way of quite some time. How about a look at wages on the top end of the corporate ladder. Consistent raises spreading the gap and shrinking the middle class. It will continue this way, until it’s over. How far can we push down the living wage, while the top earners get double digit increases. We are a consumer driven economy. When the consumers have no disposable income the economy will stall. Hopefully it will all come out in the wash. Or people will have had enough and heads will roll. How can people buy into the “high wages for the commoner are the problem” argument, when the average Canadian executive had already earned the average Canadian salary at lunch time on Jan 2, 2013?

“How can people buy into the “high wages for the commoner are the problem” argument, when the average Canadian executive had already earned the average Canadian salary at lunch time on Jan 2, 2013?”

The answer is, look at the real numbers. How many working ‘commoners’ are there for every so-called executive who earns a commoners wages by Jan. 2? One per one million?

Too many people focus on what the top 0.001th percentile are making when the problems are much more complex than that.

“Too many people focus on what the top 0.001th percentile are making when the problems are much more complex than that.”

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Absolutely. If that top miniscule minority with the multi-million dollar salaries were stripped of 99% of their incomes through taxation, it wouldn’t make the slightest difference to the betterment of the average working ‘commoner’.

Any more than increasing taxes on the incomes of those municipal employees, etc., who already make a higher than average income, would. In an effort to level them DOWN towards some lower common equality.

Why don’t we concentrate on leveling everyone UP instead?

We already have the productive means to ‘bake a bigger pie’, one big enough to satiate everyone’s hunger, or at least up to our physical limits to do just that. And those means can always be expanded.

Our failure is in thinking we can do the same thing by dividing up a smaller one equally. Doing that certainly results in everyone getting a sliver of the pie, but everyone still goes away from the table hungry, too.