Last week I wrote about exploring furloughs instead of layoffs to balance the budget. Part of my job is to come up with ideas/solutions to issues/problems. There are lots of departments in a city our size and lots of different opinions. What one department sees as black, another may see as white, and yet another, grey.
When it comes to the question of the December shutdown of City Hall (200 East Santa Clara), the reality is that it is not the same as a private sector shutdown where employees simply do not get paid regardless of accrued vacation hours.
During our shutdown we don’t save much money since 90-95 percent of employees use their vacation hours or personal leave hours. However, we do save indirectly by clearing the vacation hour liability off our books. Both public and private accounting view vacation hours as a liability since they must be paid when people leave or retire.
In private companies, there tends to be strict limits on the amount of hours that may be accrued—say 160 hours for example. When one reaches this point, there are no more hours that can be saved, so one needs to take time off or misses the ability to accrue. Our city is generous and allows twice the annual amount of vacation hours to be accrued. So depending on the bargaining unit and years of service, a city employee may save between 240-400 hours. Historically the city has made large monetary payouts when people leave or retire, especially those whose incomes exceed $100,000.
Whether it is a city’s budget director or the CFO at a company, shutdowns that use vacation hours still require an outlay of capital on payroll. If you talk to a human resources department, it is viewed from the benefits side on whether or not one may use vacation hours during a shutdown.
A true furlough, or a single day off per year “without pay” for ALL employees, would save San Jose $3 million. That money would avoid many layoffs and continue to give services to the residents of San Jose.
I still propose that the city meet and confer with unions to explore a true furlough that avoids layoffs. In addition, we should examine the amount of vacation hours that can be accrued.
A blog should be an exchange of ideas—some interesting, some thought provoking and some with another adjective that you can insert.
In the end, the budget leaves tough choices that will be upsetting to both residents and labor. The goal is to come up with ideas that leave both intact.
The budget will be discussed at City Hall tomorrow, Tuesday March 18, after 7:15pm.
P.O.
Here is one suggestion. Impose a 5% to 10% budget cut on all divisions and departments with NO exceptions. To keep the reductions non-political, mandate that the departments make the decisions where the cuts are made with no intervention from the mayor or city council.
Your thoughts P.O. ?
Pieluigi,
In your last weeks blog you made the factual assesetion that “When City Hall shuts down in December for two weeks, everyone gets paid for those days not worked….I confirmed this through the San Jose Budget Director. They do get paid during the shutdown.” You implied everyone at city hall gets paid for simply not being at work since city hall is shut down for a couple weeks.
This week you have changed your tune. You admit in so many words that it is not true workers get paid for simply not coming to work. You admit they use their own vacation time which they legally accrued. This is covered by the State of California labor code. So what? Isnt’t that the idea of having vacation hours? How come you so misrepresented this in your last weeks blog?
As far as employees accruing excess vacation hours you fail to come up with the associated reasons why this happens. In the police department, they are grossly understaffed by 600 officers, according to the Chief. That means that officers are routinely denied vacation requests or comp time off so the city has a minmum staffing of officers. I’m sure there are plenty of officers who would take you up on being forced to take time after 160 hours so they could actually use some of their vacation time. Forcing officers to use time off however could mean critical patrol or detective positions go unfilled. Those 10 murders we have had to date are not going to solve themselves. Another example; how many thousands of police hours of overtime, which translates into comp time, were created by your Little Saigon mess, and now you vilify
employees because they have extra comp time?
Leadership starts at the top down. Lets see you and the entire council and mayor take that day off without pay. Lets see you take two weeks off at the holiday without pay. Also, most city workers are very dedicatied and loyal employees. At least present accurate facts if you are going to disparge them.
Cut at least one management position in each dept.
Or, determine the ratio of managers (supts., asst.-this or deputy-that) to line workers, and cut management positions in that same ratio.
And by “cut”. I mean eliminate the position entirely, as opposed to just terminating someone and leaving the position unfilled.
PLO,
I attended the last budget meeting at City Hall and listened to various speakers from the City. One speaker caught my attention and caused concern,” the Department of Economic Development”. Paul said,” The economy is functioning fairly well”. Later on the News I herd “GW” use the same term on the news. this speaker went on with a presentation in which he spoke to statistics for Silicon Valley and the Metro area and not specifically San Jose. This was a little misleading in itself.
In his presentation he did mention a portion of “Revenue” , sales tax but absolutly no mention of “Jobs”, both are the major revenue generators for the City. Property taxes goes mostly to the County.
San Jose desperatly needs Revenue (Sales Tax and Jobs) to solve it`s problems as these two major items help the City Manager pay for City Services. We can`t keep cutting City services as the City is in the service business. We have been in the deficit position for over seven years.
If you check the Department of Economic Development`s web site you will find a chart that shows San Jose in a decline in jobs since 1998 when the job market peaked. The Chart also shows our city in a job loss decline during the Dot Com boom, yet in previous meetings this department likes to blame job loss on the “dot com era bust which began in apprx., April of 2008, our slide began in 1998 per our Dept. of E.D.
San Jose currently has 80 jobs for every 100 people and when you look at Palo Alto, this city has 360 jobs for every 100 residents.
Again, this is my area of concern, the lack of the attention given Job creation at last Tuesday`s budget meeting by San Jose`s head of Economic Development, points to one of our problems. Economic development is new jobs. This is too important of an item for Paul to skip over.
Cuts are only part of the solution.
PLO,
You said,”…the budget leaves tough choices that will be upsetting to both residents and labor, the goal is to come up with ideas that leave both intact”.
Sacrafice and cuts should be equal across the board or as equal as possible. When we see cuts come to the neighborhoods, it should be to all neighborhoods.
Mayor Reed on March 7,2008 in a memo said we have a spending problem was he addressing all neighborhoods and city services ? I believe we have a “revenue problem and have had that problem since 1998.
Back to the spending problem and all things being equal in the neighborhoods.
The consulting group hired by the City has recomended that…“the 5 to 9 million dollars of neighborhood funds collected each year for use in the neighborhoods, the next three years be transfered to the General Fund for use in Downtown (aka District 3) and Nort san Jose. The potential is $27 million be transfered to the General Fund). Excuse me but something is wrong here.
Other priorities in the report are #1 Convention Center Expansion, #2 Bof A BART Portal, #3 Vision Nort san Jose,#5 Autum Parkway/Coleman corridor. These recomendation all cost lots of $ and all have to do with District 3 expenditures.
Steakholder composition, …balancing size and representation, this item needs to be better balanced than the last group not hand picked by political insiders.
Sacrifice, cuts should come from all neighborhoods including downtown, aka District 3. We have spent opver $3 billion to date downtown per Johnmichael and now with more cuts it is recomended that we delete district three from the cuts. District three also benefits from Department of Economic Development, RDA and ceritain not for profits. I think it`s time we take a closer look at our deficit problem and its cause.
PLO, your District 6 has Santana Row in it which didn`t cost the City anything yet it generates the same sales tax revenue as downtown where we spent $3 billion. your district 6 also has Valley Fair another bib generator. District Six also has streets that badly need repair, Minnesotta and Willow St from Lincoln east to First Street just to mention two.downtown Willow Glen also generates almost $7 million in sales tax revenue with no investment.
Spending cuts need to be fair and equal across all neighborhoods. The City Manager needs to encourage D.E.D. to increase revenue through Jobs and sales tax.
I’d like the City to set a vacation/personal time “cap” – a time limit that one can accrue to encourage City employees to take time off. I believe it should be 240 hours which is about 1 month. I’d like to see it implemented effective immediately for new hires and phased in so that existing staff don’t immediately start losing their time.
There are two benefits to a cap:
) Talk about skyrocketing health care costs…many illnesses are stress related. One way to combat stress is to allow one’s body some down time. It’s also proven that time away from work allows the brain some rejuvination so that someone returns to work not only relaxed, but with a fresh perspective. (Productivity may go up, who knows?!)
1) Fulfilling a human need. Fact is, people need time off, away from work. (Even you Pierluigi need to put the crackberry down once in a while.
2) Reducing the huge payouts upon retirement/leaving the City.
Pierluigi:
The figures cited in Sunday’s Mercury News outline our city’s spending problem very simply…Since 2000, “the average total compensation of a full-time city employee has risen 53 percent…38 percent in salary and 110 percent in benefits…” In the private sector (aka “the real world”) this difficulty would be addressed by presenting the employees with the option of freezing, or reducing salaries, VS cutting jobs. (A friend who works for a major silicon valley company was faced with a similar problem. Management took a 5% reduction in salary, while non-management accepted a 3% cut. No one lost their jobs!).
I predict that Pierluigi faces an uphill battle just trying to get the one day “shutdown.”
Pete Campbell
PO
1 day off without pay from the outside world seems like an obvious option however as you know you will encounter molasses when trying to make even small changes.
PO- I would like to ask why employees are ALWAYS being targeted for cuts when managers, consultant fees, programs and departments that don’t produce, city vehicles, and projects that aren’t needed, events we fund, and feel good programs aren’t? I would like to know why this city is lacking services when there is so much waste at City Hall? PO the City is NOT corporate America were you cut employees every time a company wants to keep profits high, insert a computer program to eliminate human beings, and screw over loyal faithful, hard working employees who made your company a success.
Employees at the city are facing the same rising gas, food, living, medical, dental, housing costs we are. Council Aides don’t always work enough hours to get benefits, paid vacation, paid sick leave, or hell even a decent paycheck. They are at will too. They work long hours and do not get overtime! Council Members and the Mayor get a salary, and I can guarantee you that they have zero personal life, so what good would taking a day off do the city? I’m sure they and their families would love it, but that isn’t the point.
And Steve is 100% correct. We are now up to 15 murders in San Jose according to the Merc today. Our Police Officers and Sheriffs are way over worked, and understaffed. Police Officers have one of the highest rates of divorce, and stress related illness than any other profession. The lack of Police Officers needs to be a priority over pools, art, and any other frivolous thing we pay for.
Tina, you are asking for donations for a plaque at a pool? Why in the hell would I donate to that, when there are homeless shelters, starving kids, abused women shelters, and many more deserving programs that need the help? As to Sam “Smiling” Liccardo saving the day by getting the pool fixed, I don’t think so. He didn’t do that alone any more than he saved the day on the Little Saigon issue. Don’t you work for him?
Story on Police Officers and Fatigue.
http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_8600363
Simple question. I’d like to know how much vacation city workers are granted and how many holidays they have off per year. Also, are the vacation days consolidated with sick days or are the accrued separately?
If accrued separately, are they convertible to vacation days or can they be used to shorten the time to retirement.
We taxpayers need to know how city benefits stack up compared to what is normal in the private sector.
#9: Hi Kathleen,
Thanks for your question, and no, I do not work for Sam Liccardo.
I am a proud and dedicated volunteer for him. Do I agree with him 100% of the time? Nope, however I believe in enough of what he stands for and how he conducts himself that the few times where I don’t, it’s usually okay.
RE: Donations
Where you or anyone chooses to donate money to is up to each individual. You’re correct there are so many causes out there, some that really tug on the heartstrings. My hope in donating “time, treasure or both” to get the pool up and running (and historically rehabilitated) is to allow a place for kids to play during the summer. It seems a healthy and positive way to spend their time. It promotes a sense of family too.
RE: The plaque
Community help would be great for this community pool, which includes giving folks a sense of the history behind it. It concerns me that too many of our historic resources have been lost or the public doesn’t know the history of them. Again, community will donate where they see fit, as they should.
Thank you again for asking Kathleen,
Tina
I would amend Johnmichael’s recommendation: “Cut at least one management position in each dept.” to “cut all managers who do not manage two or more people.”
Although policies vary, some companies will cash out vacation time when you max out your accrual. It makes some sense because if they carry unused vacation time as a liability it increases over time as the employee’s salary increases.
In industry salaries generally go up with increased service time. This is not always true for public employees, though.
But if it is true, one strategy used in industry is to have employees forego a salary increase in the current year in return for a larger increase at a later time. This works out to be a better deal if the employee stays with the company.
Good point at #4, 80 jobs per 100 residents? And more and more housing is being built.
Too bad we can’t have back the well over half a billion dollars that was voted for and spent by the prior city council and mayor on the new City Hall building. We sure wouldn’t be in the financial situation we are now.
Tina Morrill,
Like you I do a lot of volunteering and donating. It is an important way to help people, and good programs while saving them money. I thought you were the Tina Morrill that works up on the 18th floor. There is a Tina up there. Do you work on the 18th floor? If so, for whom do you work for?
As to the plaque, how come there is no money allotted for this by the arts funding, or the historical society? History is indeed important, but not as important to me when we need to hire Police Officers, or repair streets.
#13- #15-Mac, and Steve- Amen to that.
#16: Kathleen,
No, I don’t work on the 18th floor or any other floor at City Hall. I am not a city employee.
Re: the plaque
The volunteers who are working w/the City to get the pool historically rehabbed are reaching out to potential partners, and this also includes the community.
# 9 Kathleen,
I agree with you. Especially when you point to city cuts in staff, especially “police services”. We are in a recession and history tells us that during recessions crime goes up. This is no time to be short staffed with police officers.
I attended the last Budget meeting Tuesday March 11th and listened to the Chief of Police talk about 67 non uniformed jobs cut from the police department. Many of these jobs still needed to be filled to meet requirements. Now we have lost 67 police officers from the streets because they are now filling office staff jobs previously filled by civilians. A uniformed officer now answers the phone.
“San Jose doesn`t have a spending problem, it has a revenue problem”. As for the police department this shortage goes back to 1994. Loss of jobs goes back to 1998. Sales tax losses going to businesses that generate sales tax dollars to pay for city services go to our neighboring cities like Campbell, Milpitas, Santa Clara and now morgan Hill.
Kathleen and PLO cuts are a short term fix and this is a problem we face, “no one in the city looks at the long term fix. If we are able to fix the deficit problem in three years and do not generate new jobs and sales tax revenue, we will be back in a new deficit problem in the fourth year.
Cutting back city services will hamper new revenue growth. The two major revenue growth items for our city come from “jobs and Sales tax revenue”. Very little about these two items are being addressed by our city leaders, especially job growth.
We have a history of waiting for the next boom to bail us out and, then we don`t do anything.
City funds from revenues should go toward revenue producing business. RDA and Economic Development monies should be invested in business that produce “new” revenue. ROI! If we don`t do this in four years from today we are going to have to do more cutting.
To Willow Glen Dad (#11): The union contracts are on the city’s internet site and available for all to see. The public doesn’t have to wonder what benefits city employees get.
#17- Thanks Tina, I found out the last name of the Tina who works there, obviously she is not you.
The Plaque:
I wonder if there is a grant or a company that might donate the funds you need for the plaque. Can you give me some info, or a contact person who has the details, cost, etc.? I know a very sweet man who owns a company that makes plaques, and awards. He is great about giving deals to worthy causes. I might be able to help you with this. You seem sweet, and sincere in wanting to see this happen. You’re my kind of person!
One extra factor is that public sector contracts often specify minimum staffing. This limits the advantage of encouraging employees to use vacation.
When a private sector employee takes vacation, the company muddles along with one less person for that week.
When a public sector employee takes vacation, minimum staffing rules can kick in, forcing the government to pay overtime to someone else. Instead of paying one person, we end up paying vacation plus time and a half.
You could solve this by negotiating a better contract. That isn’t likely- I’ve met very few politicians who even read their union contracts.
Thank you councilman,
As I expected, city employees have overly generous vacation and sick time policies. Far, far more generous than anything offered in the private sector. This leads to another question.
Are all of these benefits calculated into the current budget or are they kicked down the road?
#1
Tough to argue the fairness of a straight cut however do you believe all services delivered are equal?
#2
Thanks for you comments. Again different departments see the same thing differently so need ask more then one department on some issues.
#5
Yes Santana Row has been a very successful because of location, private investment and private marketing. Thank you Susan Hammer.
#9
Policy changes should affect everyone. Employees, Management and elected officials
#11
The sick leave payouts are generally large payouts that are greater than the vacation payouts. Sick leave is accrued at 8 hours a month that accrues with no cap. Sick leave is paid out on retirement.
Payout as follows:
Up to 400 hours paid 50% of the total hours
400-799 hours paid 60% of the total hours
800-1200 hours paid 75% of the total hours
1200 hours and over varies by the bargaining unit
For example Police and Fire if an employee accumulates over 1200 hours the sick leave payout rate will be at 100%
#24—Richard writes:“Now we have lost 67 police officers from the streets because they are now filling office staff jobs previously filled by civilians.” It’s absolutely outrageous to have a sworn officer off the streets to do civilian admin work, unless that officer is on light duty to to injury or illness.
Mac #13—I’d put the number at a minimum of ten people reporting to a “manager”
During Ford Motor Company’s last flirt with bankruptcy, they discovered there was one manager for every five line employees. Solution—they canned a bunch of managers. It worked—high paid paper pushers were out, and profits returned.
#22-PO, “Policy changes should affect everyone. Employees, Management and elected officials.” Yes I agree but managers make up to three times more than city staff does and they have much larger, and more COSTLY benefits. If I am looking at my household budget, and I am now because gas being $4.00 a gallon, a loaf of bread being almost $5.00 now, I don’t leave expensive vacations, that new diamond ring, or a $70.00 ticket to go see a play on my budget. (Sorry Tom!) These things are the first to go!
You have incredibly educated and skilled employees at the city, so why is so much money going out to consultant fees? That just doesn’t make sense to me. I also don’t get why the city keeps funding some of the programs and projects they do that don’t produce. In the private sector these are the first to go. Even the County cuts programs and departments to bare bones in lean times!
#24- Richard Zappelli, “We are in a recession and history tells us that during recessions crime goes up. This is no time to be short staffed with police officers.” That is absolutely correct. This is no time to be without Police Officers. JMO is also correct when he says,” It’s absolutely outrageous to have a sworn officer off the streets to do civilian admin work, unless that officer is on light duty to injury or illness.” There are a lot of citizens out here that are willing to volunteer their time to lesson the load of the Police in answering phones, doing paperwork, etc. There are new computer programs designed to replace human beings that could be used to make admin jobs much easier. But taking a vital Officer off the streets to answer a phone is more than I can comprehend.
Pierluigi,
How does the city spend the $60-70 million dollars it saves annually in police payroll by being perpetually 500-600 police officers under what the police department staffing should be?
#5 correction:
…Willow Glen downtown generated $700,000 in sales tax revenue last year.
Pierluigi,
I asked an acquaintance who works for the city if they get the amount of accrued sick leave or payouts which you specify city workers receive in your post #22. This person told me absolutely not.
Can you please specify which workers get the amount of sick leave you state, as your post #22 gives the impression it is every city worker, which apparently is not the case.
This reminds me of your last blog in which you state every city worker gets paid time off for no reason during the holidays other than city hall is shut down. When a couple posters corrected you we found out city workers must use their own vacation time rather than merely being granted free time as you initially stated.
#25 and #28
The City of San Jose has paid out millions in sick leave payout each year.
2007 $5,521,043.53
2006 $4,608,181.67
2005 $6,900,550.27
2007
$2,284,709.02 Non-Sworn
$2,703,006.37 Police
$533,328.14 Fire
2006
$1,769,950.33 Non-Sworn
$2,290,894.69 Police
$547,336.65 Fire
2005
$2,880,819.10 Non-Sworn
$2,966,035.61 Police
$1,053,695.56 Fire
Last nites Budget meeting had a good turn out.
Two things San Jose needs to focus on so it can provide the people of the city the services they deserve, Sales tax revenue increase and New Jobs. These two items represent the majority of the “revenue” the city collects to pay for services.
The graph presented last nite showing a loss of jobs from 1998 to 2008 made it very clear that “job loss” was the most negelected area by city management.
During the “DOT COM” booms peak years San Jose was losing jobs while other cities gained jobs. The graph provided from San Jose`s Department of Economic Development told it all. A picture is worth a thousand words.
San Jose needs to make some changes in this department, nine years of consistant job losses is a pretty bad showing. We can`t blame Mayor Reed and the new City Manager for this loss, but the opportunity to fix this problem is in their hands. In a private or public company nine years of consecuative losses would call for a big shake up in this department. The CEO and Board of Directors would be terminated too. It`s that serious.
Richard… You are right. City funds from revenues should go toward revenue producing business. RDA and Economic Development monies should be invested in business that produce “new” revenue and solid career opportunity jobs and yield a quantifiable R.O.I..
Steve Jobs did not turn around Apple by raising prices cutting R&D.
Trader Joes did not raise the price their meager wine selection to up traffic and revenue; they brought in 2-Buck Chuck and got a huge bump in free marketing, new customers, sales and ROI.
What has San Jose done over the last several decades? Raise the price of permits and fees and grown the complexity of doing business in this town. It’s almost like Economic Development became nothing more than a title on the City payroll responsible for community events.
This is a huge problem; not just for Downtown, but for all of us. If San Jose were a business and had to survive in the real world of competitive Darwinian economics. . .
Oh… did I say if?
I was truly encouraged by what I heard last night as the Mayor, Council and community came together on a budget plan. Plans are nice; but in this economy and with these social and financial problems, this in many respects the final two minutes in the forth quarter of a Division playoff game.
Much of what has to be done may not be easy to swallow or garner selected constituency support, but that’s the reality I’m hearing… top to bottom, and yes, even out here in the neighborhood.
The longterm issue for San Jose has been this continued outflux of jobs at outlined in #30. There are several reasons for this, most notably:
1) Flipping commercially zoned property for McMansions. Why does San Jose feel they need to house everyone in the bay area? We cant’ even support the intfrastructure for the residents currently living here. That is just completely moronic in my opinion.
2) Poor busness environment. The bottom line is a lot of these companies don’t like doing business in San Jose for one reason or another. I am no expert on this subject, but I hear it in business circles all the time. Perhaps there is too much red tape and fees?? Clearly a lot of workers LIVE in San Jose, and a business would benefit from having a short commute for it’s workers, but why not a lot of business in SJ?
There seriously needs to be a moratorium on building these McMansions at the expense of losing potential jobs from a business that could have been built instead. San Jose residents are hungry for it. Look at the San Jose marketplace. That is a huge success and now our residents don’t have to drive to another city to spend their tax dollars. DON’T PEOPLE SEE THAT? San Jose is just making the problem worse and killing it’s future. There isn’t much land left, and what is being developed is pretty much 90% condos. BAD BAD BAD!
Someone in San Jose is profiting big time from all these properties being sold out to developers.
PO
The amount of sick pay payouts is sickening.
Millions that could have been spent on either new police officers or lowering my taxes.
By the way you did an excellent job Monday night leading the meeting at Monroe school. Great turnout.
#32
The jobs are here in Silicon Valley, San Mateo, and San Francisco County, and they are good paying jobs. They are just not in San Jose, and what jobs we have are not the good paying jobs. This is my point. San Jose has no one to blame for this problem than San Jose.
The Mercury news recently said we just lost another 17,000 jobs. Before this release San Jose had 80 jobs for every 100 people, and now the number must be lower based on the report in the S.J.Mercury.
Palo Alto has over 360 jobs for every 100 people. Mountian View and Sunnyvale are up there too. Even, Gilroy has more than 100 jobs for every 100 people. Look how many people are employed by ORACLE in San Mateo County plus the supporting businesses. All these cities north of San Jose including San Francisco are considered “Rich” cities, San Jose is considered a “Poor” city. Why???
Just look at all the commuter traffic in the morning moving north out of San Jose on U.S. 101, Interstate 280, and Hwy 85 all going in one direction, out. Even Hwy 237 traffic moves north-west towards Sunnyvale & Mt. View. Look at the success of CalTrain north to San Francisco in the mornings on week days.The trains are packed.
Oakland and east bay cities have the same problem. Look at the ridership from Oakland to San Francisco across the Bay Bridge and BART every morning. Everyone is going where the jobs are. This isn`t “rocket science”.
San Jose`s Department of Economic Opportunity fell a sleep 9 years ago. Their own graphs tell us that. Meanwhile we keep on building housing for Freeway`s and Interstates that can`t handle the pressure.
Developers and the RDA builds housing because no one in government is stopping them. Where is the “vision”, no one is paying attention to the real problem. We need Revenue and most of the Revenue comes from (1) Sales Tax and, (2) new Jobs.
BEA Systems comming to downtown San Jose (maybe) is not bring new jobs to San Jose. Those are jobs we already have, we are spending RDA dollars to move San Jose jobs from north San Jose to Downtown San Jose.
When a company moves jobs from Santa Clara to Sunnyvale, it is a gain for Sunnyvale. That company should have moved to San Jose. Where was San Jose? S.J. was asleep at the switch.
Some times we have the right people in the wrong jobs. They are good people or excellent people in the wrong job.
Maybe it`s time for a change in D.E.D. San Jose needs a wakeup call.
PO
In reference to #35-
Most people do not get accrued sick time since 90% of us work in private sector. This is a negotiated perk that unions have negotiated. Sure everyone deserves sick time but the city should not pay out millions each year to police, fire and other city employees. This a hidden cost to government. Pensions and other perks will cripple this city. Police do a good job and should be paid but at least here we get to understand that millions of dollars are being spent this way when they could be used to hire new officers or spent on gang prevention.
“Keep on Truckin”
Pierluigi,
Please answer what you think is a reasonable amount of sick time a police officer should be allowed each month, and what do you think is the total amount they should be allowed to accrue over time? Obviously, you think it is too much now.
Personally, I think when you and the rest of the council has allowed our police department to be as grossly understaffed as it is, you have created a vicious cycle of officers getting hurt or sick thus their need for additional sick time. There is also absolutely no wellness or fitness program for the officers thus creating even more injuries and illness and more need for sick time.
I think it is amazing that you and others begrudge our police officers because they are allowed to accrue sick time, and yet we expect them to routinely take on violent criminals, be exposed to human petri dishes on a daily basis getting god knows what sicknesses, work the graveyard shift which has been shown to shorten one’s life, or ultimately lay down their life to keep us or our families safe. As far as I am concerned, street cops deserve a lot more. What ever sick time they accrue I am sure mostly gets used at some point in their life for sickness, and is well offset and more by the huge amount of money that is saved by the department being so understaffed.
By the way, I hope you keep up with the news as far as violent crime in our city goes this year. Gang violence is getting out of control it seems and that is an issue that needs to be dealt with right now before it spirals more out of control. Now that Little Saigongate is behind us maybe we can work on the safety of our entire city.
Thanks in advance for anwering my question in the first paragraph.
Richard Z,
You have my vote for mayor.
I don’t think the case is that they are asleep at the switch. Someone inside our city government is profiting from the developers that are ravaging this city. I don’t want to make accusations, but clearly if you look at the history of what this type of development brings to the city long term, you can easly conclude it isn’t a winning situation for ANY city. Especially when the number of people CLEARLY outnumbers the available jobs. SummerHill Homes, KB homes, etc. etc, those developers are paying the right people off because anytime I know of a neighbor who wants to make changes to their house, they are vigrously denied and scrutinized. However when someone wants to develop the Alameda, it get a speedy process and stamp of approval with very little to no community input. Staggering.
#26,#27
We need at least 50 additional police officers added this year. We have ten districts and 50 additional would give us 5 additional per district.
There is constant mention that the cost of our police department is a big part of our budget problem.
Everyone admits that we are running with 1994 staff levels of police officers in San Jose. It`s 14 years later (2008) the city is much larger than it was in 1994. Consider the money the City has saved running a thin police department for 14 years, below standard requirements. 14 years of savings!
S.J. Mercurynews March 22,2008 editorial page 15A. “Don`t compare S.J. to Vallejo”. San Jose alludes to the bankrupt city of Vallejo as a warning to San Jose leaders about the San Jose police benefits.
Quoting the Centeral Coast Chapter Police Officers Research Association. “Lets look at the real numbers”. “Vallejo spends 46% of it`s General Fund on police while San Jose spends only 26% of it`s General Fund on police”. “Also san Jose is below police department spending when compared to the 10 largest California Cities which, spend on the average 36% of their General funds”. “If anything San Jose is lucky to be spending so little on public safety”. “This requires San Jose Police officers to do more with less, jeopardizing themselves in the line of duty”.
The problems the city faces is with overbuilding housing without addressing the need for additional revenue in both jobs and sales tas revenue that pays the majority of City operating expences.
The problem has been with previous administrations not paying attention to the real problem and leaving the solution up to the new administration to solve.
The solution has to come from City Hall not the Union Hall. We need revenue growth. We need to stop densifying San Jose so much with all the new home construction. We need to focus in getting new jobs and new sales tax revenue.
Richard hits the nail on the head with post #38. Go anywhere in our city and you can see high rise, very high density housing projects being built. We will be adding tens of thousands of new residents over the next few years, further diluting city services and a very depleted police force working out of an out dated police facility. Citizens should get use to only the most serious of crimes being responded to by patrol officers or investigated by detectives.
Pierluigi, I am disappointed you couldn’t take the time to answer my question in post #35.
Steve,
Pierlugi didn’t respond to your number 2 post either.
And I don’t think San Jose staffers are taking money/favors from developers to allow more housing. That would be our elected officials who get contributions from the development community.
#40, I really don’t care who is benefiting. I point this out because clearly this is THE problem facing our city yet none of our elected officials want to deal with it. My post, Richard and Steve both echoed those sentiments. I think Steve makes an excellent analogy, it’s a dilution of services that is coming to us all. If you think the city is in bad shape today, give it another 5-10 years. With the developing trend on the up, up, up, and the jobs lost to other cities increasing, there will be an impossible gap to fill on city services. It’s already at critical mass, and San jose is going to need to raise taxes or borrow heavily to fill it.
The problem is obvious, but no on stops it. My reason for saying that someone is being paid to allow this to happen. It’s not logical to develop the way the city is, everyone knows this downtown.
#41
It’s not logical to develop the way the city is, everyone knows this downtown.
Which is exactly why we need to work with the county, and close Reid-Hillview. Then we can use the 180 acres in an intelligent manner to bring jobs to East San Jose, and tax revenue to both San Jose and Santa Clara county.
A side-effect is that once we start to bring good jobs into East San Jose we will see new residents moving into the surrounding neighborhoods. That in turn will be the beginning of a renaissance in East San Jose, which will benefit everyone in San Jose, as crime goes down, and neighborhoods improve.
#42 I agree with you 100%. However even with 1000 new jobs at that one spot, the ratio of # residents per job within a 25 mile radius will be 10000 to 1. The problem is beyond just one location, it’s happening all over the city on parcels here and there. The old Del monte plant, Alma bowl “hotel”, Lou’s village, etc. etc. It’s really a short term fix to a long term problem. Developers come in, pay their way around and skip town while the residents who are trying to live and make an earning in this city are left holding the bag. This is going to translate into another tax on properties to support “service dilution.” Handing out graffiti removal kits is just the start. Wait until they issue the “bust a crack addict” or “interrogate the scary homeless person” kit.
It’s coming people, wake up!