Mediation fails with city, employees

Mediation has failed to produce an agreement between the city and their unionized employees.

Contract talks with Canadian Union of Public Employees locals 1048 and 399 broke off Monday after enlisting the help of mediator Vince Ready. No further bargaining discussions have been scheduled and essential services are now being sorted out.

A tentative agreement had been reached on a number of important issues, but the two sides were at an impasse on the main issues of wages and benefits, according to city operations superintendent Bill Gaal.

But CUPE 1048 president Janet Bigelow said wages and benefits were not the main issues.

"That's not true. Our concerns are job security. Our concerns are layoff protection. Our concerns are they want to take a lot of our language out regarding some of the hours of work. That's what are our concerns are," she said.

According to a city press release, the wages of CUPE employees rose by 16 per cent (compounded) between 2008 and 2012.

Bigelow said the increase was three per cent per year over five years.

"CUPE city workers have done very well for the past five years," said Gaal. "Their wages and benefits are at the same level or higher than their counterparts in comparable communities."

During the term of the last collective agreement, which expired Dec. 31, 2012, other local public sector workers - including teachers, university and college faculty and staff, B.C. provincial government employees, and health care workers - "received much less," including two years with no wage increase, the press release said.

And while Bigelow said it wasn't the main issue, she acknowledged wages do play a role.

"If you look at all the municipalities across B.C. - municipalities, not provincial government, not school districts, municipalities - they're getting an average of two per cent per year. That's what they're getting. When the city offers nothing and nothing then yeah, there's an issue there," she said. "They're not going to stop the bleeding by not giving anything to us."

Sources familiar with proposed offer say the city has put forward a three-year deal with no wage increases for the first two years, and two per cent for the third year.

According to the CUPE BC website, other collective agreements reached in the past year and a half include the cities of Richmond, Burnaby, Vancouver, New Westminster and Port Moody all with wage increases of 1.25 per cent in the first year, 1.75 per cent for two years, and two per cent in the final year; the District of Elkford with "modest wage increases in each year and improvements to sick leave benefits"; and the Fraser Valley Regional District with a two per cent increase in the first year followed by 1.5 per cent increases for the second and third years of their agreement.

"The employees that work for the city, they stay in the city," said Bigelow. "They are part of what make the economy of Prince George work... You can't keep devaluing them."

"While we appreciate the valuable contributions made by all city workers, the city faces financial challenges and a need to control costs," said Gaal. "Increased taxpayer expectations for services and the high cost of fixing and maintaining aging facilities and infrastructure have placed heavy demands on the city budget."

The city said it is willing to reallocate some existing sick leave accruals and "other cost items" within the collective agreement to meet other CUPE priorities.

"For example, in 2012, the city spent more than $1.2 million funding sick leave for CUPE employees, money which could be reallocated to wages or other benefits," said the press release.

Last month, CUPE BC president Mark Hancock told The Citizen city employees could be lured away by private companies if the next collective agreement doesn't include wage increases.

Gaal said he disagreed with that suggestion, since even though economic forecasts for Prince George are positive, the region on a whole still has challenges as indicated by the recent mill closures in Quesnel and Houston.