Burning Through Taxpayer Dollars

Friday, April 2, 2004

Page 7

CALIFORNIA COMMENTARY (Column)

Burning Through Taxpayer Dollars

By JON COUPAL

(The writer is an attorney and president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association.)

If you smell something burning in Los Angeles, it may be your money.

The city of Los Angeles—which sets standards for bad management for cities throughout the state—anticipates a $300 million shortfall next year. Yet it will spend $84 million, nearly one-quarter of the fire department budget, on firefighter overtime this year.

While some officials say that overtime costs must be curtailed, these are just words, not action. Typically, one of the local newspapers will do a story on the cost of overtime and City Council members will “feel taxpayers◊ pain” until the story is forgotten. In the mid ‘90s there was a mild flap when it was revealed that some firefighters were doing so well on overtime that they were living as far away as Idaho, flying into Los Angeles -√ some in their own planes—to work eleven straight days and then flying back to take more than a month off.

When the issue is raised, fire officials say they are in a bind. They need to meet minimum daily staffing requirements, and paying existing personnel time-and-a-half is cheaper than hiring new firefighters when considering the added cost of their pensions and insurance. Cheaper, at least for 10 years, after which time it would have been more cost effective to have hired the new firefighters in the first place.

But thinking ahead 10 years is hard; the vision of most of those in Los Angeles city government reaches no further than next year◊s election. And it◊s a cinch that those seeking re-election are not interested in reform of the major controllable cost associated with new fire department hires, their opulent pensions.

The union representing firefighters has just announced that it is prepared to use its $1.5 million political action fund to, in the words of its president, “support our friends and punish our enemies.” As usual, establishment politicians are rushing to line up in the “friends” camp.

One of those likely to be the target of firefighter money is possible mayoral candidate, Councilman Bernard Parks, who is the city◊s former police chief. Parks’s crime? Parks has recommended caution, in these times of fiscal uncertainly, before committing to long term public employee raises that are running several times the rate of inflation.

In some communities taking a prudent approach to funding long term obligations is still considered virtuous. In Los Angeles it is an invitation for a political beating from the powerful public employee unions.

Public employee unions have long wielded great power in Los Angeles. In the early 1970s, Tom Bradley put together a coalition of black voters, downtown business interests and public employees that elected him mayor five times.

Today, however, the public employee unions have even more clout. Since the city has imposed strict limits on direct campaign contributions to candidates, the power and influence of those who can afford to run independent expenditure campaigns is compounded.

For public employee unions like the United Firefighters of Los Angeles, this is a great opportunity to elect their supporters to positions of power. A relatively small investment of a few hundred thousand dollars can return millions in raises when union representatives are seated on both sides of the bargaining table.

So while taxpayers will foot the bill this year for seven firefighters who will make $100,000 in overtime—in addition to generous base pay and benefits which include lavish pensions that the average taxpayer could only dream of—and 223 others who will earn an extra $50,000 or more, don◊t expect any rapid change to the current system.

Because of all this, the taxpayers’ dilemma worsens. They still have tremendous respect for public safety employees and believe they should be well compensated. However, these are uncertain times for taxpayers too, and there are limits on how much they can provide.

At the very least, taxpayers want to see the efficient use of resources, which means that overtime should be used for emergencies only. But the problem is more complex now, because not only the city council but the union leadership must be convinced before the fire department budget can be put on a sane, sound footing. Don’t hold your breath.