Oliverio for Supervisor 2018

Independent - Transparent - Fiscally Responsible

A Model for Police Compensation in 2013

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Note: This is Pierluigi Oliverio’s 300th Post:
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Negotiations between the city of San Jose and the Police Officers Association continue to be contentious. (Photo by Thomas Hawk).

Our goals for law enforcement in San Jose must be based on need and the amount of tax revenues on hand. As Gov. Jerry Brown stated last month, “People want to have more childcare, they want to have more people locked up, they want to have more rehab, more, more, more. More judges, more courtrooms. We have to live within reasonable limits.”

San Jose has no choice but to operate in the world of reasonable limits, and it can only allocate money that is actually on hand. The city should not make new promises that cannot be kept.

Much has been said recently about law enforcement budgeting. A year ago, I wrote two articles suggesting a specific percentage of the budget should be allocated to police, thus allowing the police department to grow in keeping with future tax revenues and a growing population. Those previous posts can be found here and here.

Since this is not the case today, I must work within the current system.

One of the shared community goals is to increase the actual number of police officers. In addition, another shared community goal is for pension reform. In my opinion, these two objectives are inextricably linked. Back in 2010, I initiated, and a majority of the City Council supported, ballot Measure W. Voters in November 2010 approved Measure W by more than 72 percent. This gave us—for the first time ever in San Jose—the ability to create a new, lower cost pension plan for future employees.

Since the passage of Measure W, a second-tier pension system has been implemented for all new city employees, except for fire and police. Neither the fire nor the police unions agreed to accept a new retirement plan for future employees—again, we are talking about people who do not even work here yet. The restructured, lower-cost retirement plan for new hires is fundamental to financial stability, and it allows us to add new police officers over time as savings are achieved through pension reform.

Countless other government entities across our state and country have implemented a tiered pension system that includes public safety unions. In my view, a second tier must be in place for fire and police prior to any compensation discussions.  Again, our Governor clearly agrees with this line of reasoning: “Pension reform can be hard to talk about,” he said. “In the long run, reform now means fewer demands for layoffs and less draconian measures in the future.”

When it comes to the present discussion on compensation, one option is to give all employees an ongoing raise. While an ongoing compensation increase may be ideal, there is no money to backfill it next fiscal year, which would then result in 100 percent pay cuts for some city employees—in other words, layoffs. Every 1-percent compensation increase to all city employees would cost $7.9 million per year. However, this assumes that all positions are equal in value, and are equal in terms of interest for recruitment purposes. I can guarantee that in any outcome achieved, no one will be happy since tax dollars are finite. Those who want, may not get; and those who get, may want more. Knowing this, I suggest an option for cash in hand now for those who enforce the Social Contract.

This proposal would function in the following manner: Each police officer would be given the option to select a scheduled redemption of their accrued benefit of up to $15,000 over 15 months, starting in the upcoming fiscal year. The $15,000 could be derived—by employee choice—from any of three accrued sources: comp time, sick leave or vacation time. These three accrued sources currently add up to over $50 million just for police officers alone, the majority of which is sick leave at approximately $36 million. This $50 million is recorded as an accounting liability and must be paid out when someone retires or resigns.

Paying a portion of this out now would reduce future payouts that would be even more costly in the future, as accrued benefits are typically earned at a lower pay scale but always paid out at the highest pay scale. This action would also enable a future council to have more money to fund city services. The $15,000 payout option would cost approximately $15.2 million if every police officer was to redeem the maximum, and would consume over half of the $22.5 million in one-time funds that are available.

There is also potential to add new police officers. On Tuesday, the council will take action on a $6.9 million reimbursement from the county on property tax recalculation. This one time windfall of money should go directly to hiring new police officers if, and only if, a new retirement plan is in place for the police union. This money could be used to “hire ahead,” which would front the cost of new officers being vetted to coincide with future vacancies as current officers retire or leave. Incidentally, $6.9 million is approximately the same amount of money the city pays to subsidize golf and the Hayes Mansion each year.

The fact is that each individual has their own economic situation, which may or may not include a variety of personal factors. Whatever the situation may be, it is impossible to examine each police officer’s household income and ensure that they are paid according to their needs. This option ultimately allows the individual to choose what is best. One individual may choose to redeem the maximum amount, while another may redeem half, while yet another may choose to not redeem at all, instead saving it up for a future potential payout. This option is based on individualism rather than collectivism.

With this spirit in mind, we acknowledge that individuals will pursue their own happiness, and, as a result, may seek employment elsewhere or a different vocation.

How the Council Set Its Priorities

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The San Jose City Council met last week to discuss and prioritize certain ordinances the city should pursue in the coming year. Creating an ordinance requires staff time from the department that the ordinance will affect and, as always, time from the City Attorney’s office. In many cases, outreach for ordinances must be done to garner resident and stakeholder input which takes time and staff facilitating the public meetings.

The city is unable to move forward with every ordinance on the “wish list” much like any other organization public or private. Therefore, councilmembers are asked to prioritize by selecting their top choices and see which of those match their council colleagues’ preferences. An ordinance moves forward if it gets six votes, and those that don’t get selected remain on the list for next time, which is approximately one year. The council selected their top choices twice and was able to prioritize seven ordinances out of 30, which include:

● Converting Hotels & Motels to affordable housing.
● Closing Medical Cannabis Collectives that do not pay Measure U tax.
● Restricting Tattoo parlors near K-12 schools.
● Development Agreement Policy (Negotiate deals for Economic Development).
● Restrict burning of wood in residential fireplaces.
● Ban any construction within 100 feet of creeks.
● Survey vacant buildings to house the homeless and more to be discussed in detail at council study session on October 29.

Some of the other ordinances that did not make it include: limiting new Wal-mart stores; a healthy eating initiative; neighborhood preservation; liquor store conversions; downtown bars that provide music pay to fund police officers.

We could have had an extended discussion on each topic, however, the items selected will come back to the council for further discussion at least two more times.

Two items I voted for that did not make the list were liquor store conversion and distinctive neighborhoods. The liquor store conversion ordinance would have the potential to eliminate existing liquor stores. Liquor stores do not really add a lot of value in my view, and I would prefer to see alcohol sold at grocery stores, because grocery stores offer a variety of food. Over time this would allow for more grocery stores to open, which is seen by many as an essential component of a neighborhood.

Neighborhoods of distinction would allow private property owners to create their own zoning based on the majority of the property owners’ desires. So, rather than government mandating regulation, it is a tool that allows private property owners to make their own decisions. For example, an Eichler neighborhood may decide that it wants to maintain Eichler architecture (Post and
Beam) for any new construction within its neighborhood boundary.

One item that made the list was converting existing hotels and motels into low income housing. This seems like it would be an interesting discussion and would have a wide variety of viewpoints, depending on how it would be potentially implemented. More to come on this topic, for sure.

Prioritizing and ranking priorities is important for organizations. However, in the case of government, certain priorities may not always represent what constituents want. The only real way is through the election process, because we have a representative democracy where we choose to elect an individual to vote on behalf of a larger population. Maybe someday residents will vote by electronic devices from their homes to select priorities midstream. Until then, it is what it is.

This week the Council will again take up the proposed Habitat Conservation Plan. Personally, I have found it curious that most of the emails I have received advocating for the implementation of the HCP are from residents outside of San Jose.

Unshackle the Police Reserves

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San Jose Municipal Code Section 8.12 authorizes the use of the Police Reserves. Although the Reserves are available, the city is not utilizing their full potential. Use of the Reserve officers could offer valuable assistance to the city because they are fully sworn and have the authority of a regular officer under California Penal Code Section 832.6(a). Reserves have already completed the police academy and carry a gun.

If the city requested, the Reserves could potentially put an extra 20 officers on the street tomorrow. There are currently over 80 Reserves on the roster. If just 25 percent responded, the city would have 20 additional sworn officers available to patrol our neighborhoods. I realize that this may require negotiation with the labor union, and there is the possibility that the Police Officers Association may not be supportive. However, I am hopeful that the city and the POA could work collaboratively and bring forward a plan that would utilize the reserves; even if the plan were in the form of a pilot program and/or for a certain amount of time. For example, if the police union and the city could agree to use reserves for one year for specific purposes, etc. At the very least, we should try.

Another goal to strive towards is allowing the hiring of retired SJPD officers to work and be paid on an hourly basis—but not accruing further pension benefits.  These retired SJPD officers could do background checks, burglary investigations, evidence gathering, get warrants, etc. for a one-year period.

Currently, the Chief of Police mandates that Reserves can only work alongside a regular officer, in the same car. Quite often the Reserve is not even counted as being in the car; thus, while there are physically two officers in the car, they are signed on as a one-man car and can only be dispatched as a one-man unit. If that practice were changed, we would see an immediate 800 hours per month of extra police patrol. Every Reserve must currently do a 10-hour shift on patrol each month (80 x 10 = 800). The Los Angeles Police Department allows Reserves to work by themselves or with other Reserves:
If the Reserves that are qualified to work as solo officers—about 80 of them are—were allowed to work on their own, they would add additional patrol cars on the streets; making a more visible police presence. I have heard that some current officers may resent the utilization of reserves and would rather not drive in the same car. If that is true, then the city and POA should allow Reserves to drive by themselves as most current officers do or allow Reserves to team up in the same car. If we allowed this, we might see many more Reserves volunteering more hours.
Reserves could also be utilized in other ways, too. For example, they could provide prisoner transport, be the second officer on a crime scene, assist in back-up when officers are sick, in court, etc. Having Reserves be part of the SJPD team would also lower overtime costs and provide time for police officers to take a vacation.

The Chief and the command staff know of the authority of the Reserves to backfill units because they already use the Reserves for the “Keith Kelly” Relief night (twice a year), as well as relief for the Police Olympics (one week a year).  Therefore, there is a current and active precedent for using the Reserves for SJPD backup.
Although the Reserves work for free, they are allotted $1 per hour of work for their uniform allowance. Therefore, the city would incur an $800.00 per month fee for uniforms for the Reserve for a second voluntary shift per month.

San Jose needs to do the best we can today and we need to utilize all of our available resources now by allowing the Reserves to be visible patrolling San Jose neighborhoods. Utilizing Reserves and Retired SJPD is a cost effective way to provide law enforcement during this time with limited tax revenue.

Shucking Corn

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Picture a corn field with a farmer shucking corn by hand. His focus is on shucking the corn and he does it very well. However, this farmer can only do so much in a day and thus is provided an opportunity to assemble farm equipment which will shuck more corn than present resources allow. However, to do so will mean that he will stop shucking the corn in the interim and consequently lose some portion of the crop to crows and rodents who will eat the corn if the farmer is not present.

Fortunately, our farmer has the money to pay a qualified retired farmer to assemble the farm equipment while he continues to shuc. He will soon have extra help in the field and thus be more productive. Sounds like a good plan. Our farmer is out in the field being vigilant of his farming duties, which includes warding off crows and rodents while the farm equipment is being assembled.

However, what would you say if the farmer was too proud and refused to allow a qualified retired farmer to help him assemble the farm equipment? Instead, he continues to farm the field himself into the evening hours, becoming tired and overworked. He may make a mistake while falling further behind. Hence, the farmer is never able to take advantage of augmenting his farming with the equipment and thus loses a large portion of the crops to crows and rodents.

Sounds silly to me. Why not accept qualified assistance so the farmer can do a better job in the field and remain vigilant in farming duties?

Well, this is currently the situation for our San Jose Police Department (SJPD). We have more qualified candidates who would like to join SJPD than open positions. The next step is to require a background check. Typically background checks are done by current SJPD, which means that 17 police officers are pulled from patrol. These police officers cannot be in two places at once and therefore this results in less police on patrol.

This topic among others was discussed at Public Safety committee two weeks ago. Police Chief Chris Moore would like to hire a private company to do the background checks rather than pulling police officers from patrolling the neighborhoods. The private company does this for other cities and they employ retired police officers to do much of the work and some of them are actually retired SJPD. However, the Police Officers Association objects to this and would rather pull police from patrol to do the background checks. I am told that on-duty police officers would do a better job since they have higher standards than retired police officers. However, the absence of 17 police officers from patrol creates a heavier burden on the remaining officers on patrol and less police presence on the streets.

I admire our San Jose police officers that work hard and return home safely after each shift. However, I also believe that law enforcement officials in other jurisdictions are good people as well. Retired law enforcement from the Sheriff’s office, Fremont and Mountain View, for example, are qualified to do background checks on prospective candidates for SJPD.

The idea of using retired police officers to do backgrounds triggers the process of union negotiations called meet and confer. I do not like the secrecy of meet and confer and would rather have negotiations public. In my view, the utilization of retirees should be something the city and police union could easily agree upon. I would prefer that this issue be discussed in public, rather than behind closed doors, to avoid hurt feelings and focus on more important matters.

I understand the need for union negotiations for wages and benefits. However, it does not look good when unions contest small items like assistance from retired officers or waste time and money defending people who should be terminated.

For example, the firefighters union filed a grievance for the right to have pornography in each fire station. In addition the firefighters union argued that termination of a fireman was too excessive when the civil service commission recommended he be terminated for sexual harassment of two female co-workers that included unsolicited massages, kisses, birthday spankings, and other inappropriate touching and banter. This is sad.

Making a mountain over a molehill creates negative PR for the union and in my view should be dropped since it hurts their credibility on negotiations that pertain to wages and benefits.

Prioritizing Future City Spending

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At the upcoming Aug. 7 City Council meeting, the discussion will focus on how to prioritize city spending IF revenues increase. So, in the example below, if revenues increase by $10 million—either by revenue growth or tax increase—this is how I think it should be spent by percentage. We will still be spending money on all of the city services included in the current budget, however, this example is for future potential revenue that is above the budget passed in June:

53% — Police $5.3M
15% — Road Paving $1.5M
5% — Planning, Building & Code Enforcement $500K
4% — Libraries $400K
2% — Tree Planting & Tree Trimming by Our City Forest $200K
2% — City Attorney’s Office $200K
2% — Information Technology $200K
2% — Pedestrian & Bicycle Safety-slowing cars down in neighborhoods $200K
3% — Pay down Debt $300K
2% — Save Money for Rainy Day Fund $200K
10% — Discretion of City Manager with Approval by Council to be Distributed to Human Resources, Finance, Public Works, Economic Development and/or a Need That Becomes Apparent in the Future $1M

There is no extra allocation for the Fire Dept., as Fire Chief William McDonald and staff have been successful in obtaining federal grants. Federal grants are great in the short term, but they will make it more difficult to allocate future funds to hiring police officers—which is why the majority of future revenue is allocated to police. In addition, I agree with the 2011 Santa Clara Civil Grand Jury that San Jose could utilize three firefighters on a fire engine like every other city in the county. The data in San Jose shows that calls for service are 4 percent structural fires and 96 percent non-fire calls, mostly medical. Any cost savings from realigning resources to match call data should go to police.

We need to allocate general fund dollars to the Planning Department rather than increasing and relying on fees. Development can be sped up this way, increasing our tax base and private sector employment base to fund city services. Funding of Code Enforcement to keep our city safe/looking good and also could bring in revenue by assessing fines to irresponsible property owners—especially apartments that are ill kept.

Adding some funding to libraries is good, but much more can be done with volunteers to keep the doors open than is done today.

One way to make San Jose more visually attractive is through more tree planting, including maintenance, which also has other positive environmental attributes. Putting 5 percent aside to pay down high interest debt and save for a rainy day fund is prudent. Allocating something, even though small for Information Technology, must be done to achieve efficiencies and put a down payment on upgrading the financial software of the city to enable more sharing of financial information with the public.

The city manager, as chief operating officer, needs flexibility in allocating funds where the council or general public may not be aware of the need today. Of course, any action should require Council approval, but 10 percent between so many different needs may not provide enough. The city manager will have to make do.

Libraries, Police: Two Great Tastes That Taste Great Together

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A citizens signature drive is underway to secure a certain percentage of the budget for our libraries. This would replace the library parcel tax set to expire in 2014. If enough signatures are collected, the measure could be placed on the ballot in November.

Single-issue advocacy may come at the cost of something else. However, setting aside a specific percentage of the budget for a specific purpose is the only way to guarantee it is done. Elected officials often fund services not within their scope of responsibility. Last month, I proposed examining and collecting data for setting a certain percentage of the budget—higher than today’s percentage—for the police department. My proposal will come back for discussion during the budget process.

You can argue the merit perspective on both libraries and public safety. On one hand, public libraries are an equalizer, which allow youth the opportunity and access to information both paper and electronic. Libraries are considered a special place in the heart of many academics that populate our valley.

On the other hand, police are the only enforcement of the Social Contract that allows us to walk back and forth from the library without being assaulted. We can always hope for the best in prevention, but there are those in society who are deviant. Even if they’re provided a free public education, an open library or community center, they opt out. At this point, a book or DVD won’t do much to stop an act of violence while you’re going to and from the library.

Perhaps we could combine the ideas and set a percentage of the budget for police and libraries. It would bring together the two most popular city services and cover the bases with both camps of San Jose residents. I believe most would say that a city is doing good job when it has an excellent police force and library branches that are open. Otherwise, the risk is that tax revenue could be spent on items not in the City Charter.

We should strive to have the best city possible—a library system open seven days a week, augmented by unpaid volunteers, and a police force able to respond to calls for service. Being proactive could eventually enforce the quality-of-life concerns our residents have.