From The Times-Herald, August 27

VALLEJO, CA – Vallejo city and fire union officials have agreed to a controversial plan to tear up the employees' contract and start negotiating a new one.

The move leaves only one of the city's four employee unions -- the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) -- without some type of contract agreement. Officials also have called for a federal bankruptcy judge to gauge that contract's burden on city coffers.

The city has been working through Chapter 9 bankruptcy since May 2008, when city spending surged past bleak revenue forecasts, and ate through reserves.

Bankruptcy attorneys for the city and fire union codified their deal with a court filing Monday, though the agreement was signed Aug. 18. A judge will review it today in Sacramento.

In the agreement, city and fire negotiators have drawn up a plan to fast-track contract talks. Negotiators will have until Sept. 30 to forge a new contract. If unsuccessful, a mediator will be asked to step in -- for up to five days. And, if that doesn't work, an independent arbitrator would listen to both sides for up to seven days before making a final ruling.

The two sides will look at all employee contract aspects including salaries, benefits and working conditions, city spokeswoman JoAnn West said Wednesday.

West added the two sides may not need to resort to binding arbitration, but that "we don't want to be spending a lot of time in negotiations if they're not successful."

The city and union also agreed to work out how to deal with any damage claims firefighters file resulting from contract changes.

International Association of Firefighters, Local 1186 President Kurt Henke said Wednesday his membership approved the move last week.

Mayor Osby Davis said it is unclear whether an outside arbitrator would favor the city or union.

"Who knows what that's going to look like," Davis said Wednesday. "That's the fear and that's the unknown that the city has found itself in before -- and that the city does not need to be in, an outsider deciding the city's future."

Davis said he hopes that any arbitrator would be fair, and take into consideration the city's dismal finances.

Less than a year remains on the firefighters' existing contract, which city officials sought to throw out in June 2008. Representatives from the fire, police and other non-management workers unions initially joined in challenging the city's insolvency claims, and later to fight the dissolution of their contracts.

In January and February, city management workers -- who had not challenged the bankruptcy petition -- and police negotiated modified and extended contracts, including provisions for potential salary hikes in coming years.

IBEW Vice President Ken Shoemaker said the union's city workers, spread across most city departments, are not set to follow in firefighters' footsteps.

"We are definitely not going to throw our own contract out," Shoemaker said Wednesday. "The judge will have to do this."

Shoemaker said IBEW members are confident that they do not represent a significant burden on the city's general fund. Shoemaker estimated that his union workers' cost to the fund is only about 6 percent or 7 percent.