Politics & Government

UPDATE: Police Contract Talks Stall, Arbitrators To Make Decision

Caledonia Police Union asked for a 2 percent raise from the Village if they also paid 2 percent of their salaries towards their pension, which was agreed during negotiations with the Personnel Committee. Now, the Village Board won't vote on the agreement.

UPDATE: After contract talks broke down, arbitrators have submitted offers to the state.

We have calls into officials with the Village and will update the story when we get a comment from them.

ORIGINAL STORY: Contract talks between the Caledonia Police Union and the Village of Caledonia seem to have broken down even though the two sides are technically still in the mediation process.

Find out what's happening in Caledoniawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Even though the Village and the Police Union had a tentative agreement with the Personnel Committee on March 8, which was ratified by the union on March 15; the Village Board won't vote on that contract. Now, no further discussions are scheduled, and Village Administrator Tom Lebak said today that the two sides seem to be “careening towards arbitration.”

The Caledonia Police Union in January with the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission indicating that if mediation talks failed, they would likely seek arbitration. Contract negotiations broke down after a tentative, three-year agreement was reached between the Personnel Committee and the union on March 9, but the Village Board shot down that agreement on March 13.

Find out what's happening in Caledoniawith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“The union rejected what the Village Board offered at their meeting on March 15 and we seem to be careening towards arbitration,” Lebak said.

Still, there was no formal vote taken on March 13, Lebak said.

The Village Board agreed to reject the offer through “consensus” in a that did not have the item listed as a topic to be discussed as it had been in a prior Personnel Committee meeting on March 8, 2012.

The union contract expired on Dec. 31 but the union has been operating under the terms of the old contract.

Act 10, or the budget repair bill, was signed into law last year by Gov. Scott Walker. The law restricted the ability of public employees to negotiate anything but wages. Work rules about things like vacation, sick days, work hours and the work week for teachers, highway workers, clerical support and any other represented state or municipal employee now fall under the personnel manual for non-represented employees.

But Governor Scott Walker exempted police and fire from being covered under Act 10, leaving municipalities with short windows of time to hammer out agreements to close holes in their budgets.

Lebak wouldn’t comment on what was in the tentative agreement that was shot down by the Village Board.

But an anonymous source familiar with the terms of the initial agreement said it included giving represented police a 2 percent raise per year if they agreed to pay 2 percent into their retirement pensions for three years, which ultimately zeroed out the increase. After the three years, the Police would then pay 5.9 percent of their salary towards their pension. They would also be switched from a higher deductible and co-pay insurance plan to one with lower deductibles and co-pays, the same insurance plan non-represented employees currently have.

Tom Weatherston, a Village Board member said the only offer on the table at the March 13 closed session meeting was shot down, but it wasn’t a formal vote.

“You have to vote in open session,” he said. “To vote in closed session would be illegal. But I can tell you what I think… I have a moral issue with giving one segment (of our employees) a raise – with the guys in the engineering and highway departments, and all of the rest of the non-represented staff having no pay raise and paying their share of their pension – they are paying out of pocket for those things. And I have a moral issue with giving protective services a raise when the others are taking a hit like that.”

But if an arbitrator decides that a contract calling for pay increases with an offset with pension payments is the best choice, he would be OK with the decision, Weatherston said.

The state mediator now has the Caledonia Police Union’s preliminary final offer, which was the one the Village Board said wasn’t acceptable, Lebak said.

Both sides were asked to submit copies of their contracts to the state mediator, and they will be exchanged on March 30. The offers won’t be published until they are submitted to the mediator.

Peter Davis, who serves as general council for WERC, said he didn’t know any of the details surrounding the contract negotiations, except that both sides had been attempting to settle it through mediation.

If that fails and no one wants to make any final changes, the process moves to the collection of final papers, an arbitrator is chosen, and the arbitrator selects one of those offers. The chosen offer then becomes the contract, Davis said.

“Right now we’re in a waiting game,” Lebak said.

*This version corrects a prevision version, which should have stated that a tentative agreement made between the Personnel Committee had been accepted by the Union. However, the Village Board rejected the agreement.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here