Firefighters local clarifies pay issues

The members of the Cape Girardeau Firefighters Association Local 1084 would like to take this opportunity to clarify a few of the issues surrounding the current pay debate within the city of Cape Girardeau.

To begin with, we would like to point out that this is a citywide issue that is affecting all departmental employees. This has been established by dialogue we have had with other departments along with the statements that some of their representatives have made to the media.

A leading concern for city employees is the lack of communication and openness demonstrated by our city administration. We also have concerns regarding the fairness demonstrated by the city of Cape Girardeau in recent pay and benefit dealings.

City representatives have engaged in ongoing negotiations with a city department, which is counter to past city practices and procedures. Since the city has established a collective-bargaining practice with this department, we respectfully request that we and all other city departments be afforded the same level of fair treatment.

When the citizens of Cape Girardeau passed the fire tax in 2004, it was promised that a priority for these funds would be to ensure competitive salaries for the police and fire departments. In less than four years, however, the city has fallen short of this key goal. Contrary to figures provided by the city of Cape Girardeau, the fire department has fallen significantly behind in pay. In fact, the fire department's pay is 89.3 percent when compared to the cities selected by the city of Cape Girardeau for the pay study.

Also disturbing is the fact that the city administration provided an extra personal day for the police department only. This contradicts the city's stated policy of treating all departments equally. This fairness doctrine was the rationale used for slashing the fire department vacation and sick leave for new employees in 2006. This is despite the fact that fire department shift employees work approximately 500 hours more per year for the same level of pay as a police officer.

Most troubling of all for our members is the damage recent events have caused to our relationship with the city administration. Pay plan updates were distributed, which at the time did not accurately reflect the city's intended actions concerning pay raises within the police department. Questions have arisen concerning administrative pay-raise levels, which have gone from none to 2 percent to 4 percent, depending upon which media source you cite.

It is also difficult to understand why the city was able to fund a citywide pay plan when the fire tax was passed in 2004 but made no such provisions when the park tax was passed this year. Clearly, city finances had been identified as lacking, and the park tax was twice the amount of the fire tax. It would have seemed prudent to appropriate a portion of this larger fund in similar fashion as accomplished with the fire tax.

While some of these inconsistencies may be attributed to oversights, misunderstandings or miscommunication, the fact that they exist is still disconcerting at the very least. We believe the people of Cape Girardeau and the city's employees are entitled to timely, accurate and relevant information concerning these issues. To date we are not satisfied that this has been accomplished.

While we disagree substantially from the views expressed by some members of the Cape Girardeau city administration, we hope we can re-establish a professional, respectful and constructive dialogue regarding these issues. We realize a mutually agreeable solution is best for our member, the city of Cape Girardeau and, most importantly, the people we all serve.

Dean Lynn is a captain in the Cape Girardeau Fire Department and president of the Cape Girardeau Firefighters Association Local 1084.