Recently I wrote there was a historical mistrust…recent raises don’t help…
I understand wanting to reward people for their work, I really do. Yet during the current economic climate learning that Mayor Mike Bell has given raises to top level staff makes me cringe. It doesn’t matter how he justifies it, it adds to the mistrust between unions and the administration and makes it even more difficult to go to them to ask for concessions it also makes it more difficult to convince the public that an additional temporary income tax needs to be passed.
Lots of people out there deserve raises, my husband is one of the hardest working guys I know, he’s taken on more responsibility as jobs have been cut and not only is he not getting a raise, employer contributions to 401K has ended and our health insurance is going to cost 11% more this year. I know many of you are experiencing the same thing, either having to pay more for your health care or either getting smaller raises (if you get a raise at all).
When I know that the budget deficit Toledo is facing is going to be at least 5 million dollars more than is being put out there because of the increased payout costs from retirements and there is less than 50 days until there has to be a balanced budget, I can’t help but ask, “What is Mayor Mike Bell thinking?” I realize the justification being given is that the Mayor has less staff than before, but perception is everything and the perception from a citizen and a union standpoint is not going to be positive…
Passing out generous raises to top administrators is going to have a chilling effect on negotiations with the labor unions. Asking the rank and file to tighten their belts so that the bosses can have a little more is not a good start for this administration. I know that the political appointees are going to work really really hard and they deserve the money they earn. But so do the workers at the other end of the spectrum.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:12 amWell written Ron, I agree.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:14 amAnd here all along I thought the way to reduce debt and trim costs was to lighten, not fatten the pockets of taxpayer employees. Silly me….
There’s no mistaking that this was a poor, very poor decision and choice and he has as much as shot himself in the budgetary foot… dumb move..stupid.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:37 amJust to be clear, the budget just increased $88,113 from these changes. Kind of makes you wonder what else has/will be done.
Kind of reminds me of the story of one of the airlines where they negotiated the union to take a pay cut and then gave pay raises to the upper mangement, just in reverse timing order here.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:42 am(sarcasm)Wouldn’t that make the Human Resource department easier?(/sarcasm)
Seriously though, this seem like that typical governmental BS where they can never let a dollar saved go to it’s proper place.
This is like my wife telling me she saved me a bunch of money because all the useless items she bought were an sale. We saved some money on a bloated staff that was highly criticized at the time and Mayor Bell uses that as a justification of this? Ridiculous in the extreme. This time I will back the Unions in thier arguments. Give him hell boys and girls, give him hell.
February 9th, 2010 at 11:43 amBad call. You can’t cry poverty and then give more money to city employees.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:08 pmThis shows the horrible business accumen of Mayor Bell. These people accepted the lower pay in the past and remained in their jobs. Clearly it was enough compensation to keep them in the same job in the past so there should be no reason to give them substantial increases now, especially in light of the employment situation in this area.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:10 pmIt’s a shame that an administration that came in with such a high level of trust by citizens and the unions has managed to make it disappear with the apparent skill of a professional magician. Such legerdemain is normally applauded on the stage, but I fear that there is little clapping in the audience today.
The true shame however, is that the Mayor has done little here but bolster the position of long intransigent unions and as a consequence it is likely to make the situation more difficult to resolve.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:18 pmI remember how his campaign seemed a little empty on substance and he ran on how he was going to work with all the different groups to make progress. Looks like he is just going to give everyone what they want and pray for it to work out in the end. Can’t always be liked Mr. Bell, it’s not always in the cards as a leader.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:26 pmThe true Mike Bell is coming out, he should have never been elected mayor, his playbook comes from his years with Carty. I have been an avid supporter of WSPD and Brian Wilson, but I think Mr. Wilson has been fooled terribly by Mr. Bell’s ability to BS. Who is the pant load now? Its only going to get worse. Remember this is the same man that took business away from private ambulance and was celebrated for it.
February 9th, 2010 at 12:27 pmMaybe Mike Bell is still thinking he his subject to departmental budgeting? Now I don’t know how it works in public sector, but in a company I used to work for, you really tried to keep your budget close to your spending year after year. If you actually was able to save some money, you had to find a way to spend it fast otherwise next year upper management would ask why you need to spend so much when you didn’t need it the year before. So maybe Mr. Bell is thinking “Holy crap, we saved too much, quick spend it so when we want this amount next year it won’t look so bad.”
February 9th, 2010 at 12:35 pmPerception is reality, or so I have heard it said. Having put that forth, I suspect many Toledoans feel betrayed about all this.
February 9th, 2010 at 1:19 pmSo Bell wants to increase our taxes and he passes out huge pay raises to his staff? He has no sense of how to run a city that is facing a $44 million deficit. Mike, you won’t have my vote to raise the income tax while others in Toledo have to make sacrifices, including cutting back on their own expenses, to stay financially afloat.
February 9th, 2010 at 1:37 pmMaybe Mike truly wants the city to go into receivership. That way he doesn’t have to make the tough decisions.
February 9th, 2010 at 1:38 pmBy giving the upper management the increases he felt they deserved, he all but just told the unions to keep what they have. In so doing were all angry and there is no way we tax payers are going to approve an increase.
So Mike keeps going through the motions, but really accomplishes nothing, there for the state will step in an clean this mess up.
He walks away with his hands clean.
This decision is extremely unfortunate. Ultimately, the entire City of Toledo will suffer.
Michael Bell’s unfathomable action in this matter certainly adds credibility to those who supported Keith Wilkowski based upon his better understanding of the way the political system and local government work. I do not know Keith that well, and I cannot guarantee that, overall, he would have been a better mayor than Mike Bell, but from the conversations I’ve had with Keith, and from his public positions, I can guarantee that Keith would have NEVER given these raises.
Before the election, I was one of those who stated on blogs that I was extremely concerned about Mike Bell’s reference to owners and managers being given greater respect because they run things while workers provide the labor. Others stated that I was crazy; that Bell was stating this in the context of bringing everybody together, and respecting everyone’s contributions. Perhaps those who criticized me, and others who thought the same way I thought, will rethink their position on Bell. It seems obvious that Michael Bell values the contributions of managers more than he does those who directly deliver services when he demands significant cuts in wages and benefits from the common worker while arrogantly increasing salaries for their supervisors. Can Toledo City Council pass an ordinance rescinding these raises?
Mike Bell’s actions remind me of the infamous line attributed to Marie Antionette while the common people of Paris were starving and calling for bread. At a lavish party for European nobility, the French queen was quoted as saying, “Let them eat cake!”
February 9th, 2010 at 2:35 pm@Tim Higgins: +1
And on top of this, TPS wants to institute an income tax.
How can the political class in this City/County/State be so freaking tone-deaf??
February 9th, 2010 at 2:40 pmI’m not going to try to suggest that this was anything but an unfortunate PR move for the Bell administration in the current budget circumstance but in at least some (maybe most) of these cases the individuals involved are doing a different job than what they did previously. You wouldn’t expect that a fry cook at McDonalds who gets promoted to store manager would still be paid minimum wage. They would be paid what a store manager gets. Nor is the local paper reporting on the outsiders brought into the Bell Administration and on what they are paid now compared to what they were paid in their previous job or for that matter what the predecessor in their job got paid. The paper does point out that Lourdes Santiago has had her salary adjusted (downwards) in her new job in the administration but no one is raising cane about that being unfair.
Almost no one in our society chooses to work at an occupation for no compensation, they all hope and expect to be paid a fair wage for what work they have chosen to do. However when it comes to public positions and compensation, no one believes that employees in the public sector should be paid what they are.
Pretty much a lose-lose situation for everyone involved within the City government.
I agree that the City is still bloated and has traditionally chosen to be involved in many areas that is not its charter-driven responsibility and has made many bad decisions about compensation such as pension-pick-ups. Until the administration real does cut all “extraneous” services to the bone, and does away with the “too generous compensation” issues, it will always be subject to the citizens ire.
February 9th, 2010 at 3:17 pmAnd the justification responses begin…….
February 9th, 2010 at 3:25 pmand the denial of reality continues…
February 9th, 2010 at 3:30 pmJustSomeGuy,
From what I saw, no one went from ‘fry cook’ level to ‘Store Manager’ level. People go from supervisor to manager all the time like this.
I can tell you right now that there are many people working and doing jobs above thier title or filling titles without compensation. Unlike government though, these people will not get the money until there is money to be got. They get promises and assurances and if they don’t like it, they are always free to go elsewhere (I hear there is a lot of opportunity and jobs now)
February 9th, 2010 at 3:32 pmOne can see through your reality, your a supporter of Mr. Bell, someone who has no experience politically. He ran an empty campaign, he has no experience in the private sector, and just like our president he thinks that everyone in government should be “paid”. Tell me where Mr. Bell has collected his pay check for the last 30 years ? He has no intentions of fixing the budget mess, just wants to have meetings and get other peoples ideas, so he can brandish them as his own. Tell one thing he has planned to help Toledo grow. Oh I know one, CHANGE THE SIGNS… brilliant.
February 9th, 2010 at 3:39 pmSantiago makes less because she took a lessor position, so I don’t see that as a huge issue to point out, had her salary stayed the same that would have been an issue.
Most of the administrative staff makes less than they would in the private sector, some of them make less than the hourly union workers, that is a problem in attracting and keeping high quality staff. It’s been like that for several years, but given the current economic climate, now does not seem like the time to address that.
February 9th, 2010 at 3:45 pmWind Man,
If you are referring to me as being the supporter of Mr. Bell, you have assumed wrongly. I supported neither Mr. Bell nor Mr. Wilkowski and didn’t then nor still don’t see either of those men as a solution to the problems that plague Toledo from its years and years of domination by one line of thinking largely stemming from one political party. Both Mr. Bell and Mr. Wilkowski are too much a product of the system to have any measurable degree of sucess as changing that system. If you really believe the citizens of Toledo would have seen a different approach under a Wilkowski regime, you are afflicted with a similar lack of reality. Do you remember who Wilkowski supported for President (local campaign chair if I’m not mistaken)? Seen any results about reducing the size of government and its programs from that candidate’s ongoing approach now that we’ve experienced it during its first year? As long as Toledo keeps in-breeding the results will stay the same.
February 9th, 2010 at 3:50 pmBut how about the benefit package they receive? Anyone in the private sector would love to have those benefits…. I think that makes up for the wage difference, and in reality it is not much different.
February 9th, 2010 at 3:51 pmWind Man,
I think we’re all in agreement that the lack of checks and balances locally have created a distorted system for compensation. Certainly the “perks” are a major factor in that. If the “perks” were more in line with what the private sector would deem fair or reality, then I don’t think that there would be many complaining about the wages being paid or the increases received for a more responsible position. As just one example, David Welch is the Director of Public Service. I suspect he probably has in the range of 400 or more employees working under his direction and oversees a number of disparate divisional operations. $80,000 is not a lot of money for someone who oversees an operation of that scope.
February 9th, 2010 at 4:00 pmWindman, when you have union employees who don’t want to go into administration because they’d have to take a pay cut, it is a problem. The city does have a good benefit package and retirement, but considering some of the salary ranges and benefit packages for higher level executive positions in Toledo, that also appears low. Now, if you are comparing what are considered more “regular” positions, union and non-union alike are better off than many in the private sector though the non-union city workers in lower level administrative type positions have not gotten the same level of pay raises the union membership has.
This does not mean now is the time to address that though, it is however something that should be pointed out.
February 9th, 2010 at 4:24 pmLisa,
I have to disagree with you on the issue of artificial term limits. Nothing involving human beings is perfect, but incumbency does NOT ensure re-election.
I already used the example of the last two Toledo mayors being held to one term each, against their wishes. But I can go back to 1970 when a relatively unknown John Gilligan defeated a very popular U.S. Senator, Frank Lausche, in a statewide Democratic Primary election! Gilligan lost the General Election that year to Robert Taft, Jr. Then, 6 years later, the very liberal Howard Metzenbaum defeated incumbent Robert Taft, Jr. in the 1976 General Election. Defeating the son of Mr. Republican, Robert Taft, Sr., and the grandson of onetime President and Chief Justice of the United States, William Howard Taft, in a conservative state like Ohio was no small feat. Or how about in 1982 when the long-time incumbent Member of Congress, Thomas Ludlow “Lud” Ashley, was defeated right here by an almost totally unknown Ed Webber? No one thought that Ashley could ever lose!
But, you miss (purposely ignore?) my more important point: do you really want even more stringent term limits that will further shift governmental power from elected officials to bureaucrats? It seems as though those who favor term limits feel that these limits give the citizens more control over government. I submit that the exact opposite is true. The power will be there, one way or the other. Artificial term limits places that power in the hands of unelected bureaucrats and lobbyists for special interests, as these limits take power away from elected officials. Elected officials go, bureaucrats and lobbyists stay!
Despite the political “musical chairs”, there are far less people with experience in the Ohio General Assembly now than there were before artificial term limits were put into place. Look it up! Far fewer elected officials have a grasp on how the legislature works now than was true before artificial term limits. Just when they’re starting to really understand the system, they’re out of office…not because they are incompetent, not because they abuse their power, but because their time is up!
More than anything else, artificial term limits, limit the voters’ ability to keep in office elected officials who know how to do their jobs and do them well! Were there ever abuses? Of course! We’re talking about human beings here. But the system worked far better than does the current system. Those who fought to get artificial term limits just don’t want to admit that the cure is worse than the disease!
February 9th, 2010 at 4:49 pm