A new collective bargaining agreement between the borough and its workers’ union hiked wages, increasing borough spending by up to $1.1 million over the next three years.
The Haines Borough Assembly on Tuesday unanimously voted to adopt the collective bargaining agreement between the borough and Public Employees Local 71. The union ratified the contract at its own meeting Monday night.
Borough chief fiscal officer Jila Stuart named wage increases as the most significant change from the past three-year contract.
The new agreement increased the base level of each pay range by about $1 per hour and eliminated the lowest-paid tier, which had compensated workers starting at $11 an hour. Under the new contract, hourly wages for the borough’s 56 union employees now range from $14.75 to $35.26 per hour.
The agreement, which took effect immediately, also moved some positions, such as police dispatch and wastewater operators, into higher pay grade categories – and made them eligible for standby pay – because the borough has been “having a terrible time recruiting” for these positions, borough manager Annette Kreitzer said at Tuesday’s meeting.
It also set out yearly increases in the employer’s share of health insurance premiums across the board and introduced a provision to allow employees to save up their personal leave time longer if staffing shortages prevent them from using it in the near term.
Other modifications include higher hourly pay bumps for night shifts and a lower threshold for workers to be considered “regular employees.” Whereas workers previously had to log 20 hours a week to be eligible for holiday pay and personal leave, now employees who work at least 15 hours weekly can receive those benefits.
And while the old contract raised each pay grade in the second and third years by a set percentage, the new agreement plans to adjust pay grades according to changes in the consumer price index.
All Haines Borough employees are part of the bargaining unit unless they hold one of seven explicitly exempted positions: borough manager, borough clerk, chief fiscal officer, police chief, public facilities director, contracts and grants administrator and assessor.
Negotiations between the union and the borough were ongoing when the assembly passed the new fiscal year’s budget at its June 14 meeting.
Borough manager Kreitzer had factored a 2% wage increase for all borough employees into the budget, while warning assembly members that the true price of the contract would likely exceed that placeholder figure.
According to a chart prepared for assembly members by Stuart, the drafted agreement is projected to surpass the placeholder value by at least $856,000 – though not more than $1.1 million – over its three-year span.
This year, the borough will pay the $229,799 difference between the budgeted and actual contract using unallocated one-time pandemic-related money that Kreitzer held back for this purpose, she said. A concern is how the higher contract will be covered in the second and third years of the contract.
“In ensuing years, because of the inflation modifier that’s included in the contract, we’ll have to see what the actual number is,” Kreitzer said.
Kreitzer said the sticking points in negotiation, as always, were “wages and healthcare benefits.” Inflation and rising costs had prompted the union’s demand for higher wages at the same time as these issues had made the borough feel more strapped than usual. “We tried to be respectful of each other’s positions and listen very hard to what the concerns were,” Kreitzer said.
Jordan Adams, business manager for Public Employees Local 71, made a point of expressing his gratitude to Kreitzer, who he said was “professional and fair.”
He agreed with Kreitzer that inflation was “on everybody’s radar” and said he believed the borough needs to be more competitive to retain its workers, especially in a competitive job labor market where other employers are increasing salaries.
“I think we got a healthy increase, but I also thought it was extremely fair,” Adams said.
Adams said the majority of the union’s membership attended Monday’s meeting, and the contract passed with more than half the vote, but he declined to go into specifics.
He said the union’s local negotiation team was formed of five volunteer members: a water and sewer employee, a librarian, an administrator, a police dispatcher, and a police sergeant.