City’s executive committee votes not to pursue EI top-up benefit
The City of Regina’s executive committee has voted not to pursue an EI top-up benefit asked for by the city’s three unions to help members impacted by COVID -19.
“At the end of the day, we’re hoping that we’ll be able to return some services and ultimately get employees back to work, but that is dependent on, obviously, the Re- Open Saskatchewan Plan,” city manager Chris Holden said during an executive committee meeting Wednesday.
CUPE Local 21, CUPE Local 7 and the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU) 588 made a joint submission to city council on April 15, requesting the city provide their laid-off members a Supplementary Unemployment Benefit Plan (SUBP).
But a report from administration that was reviewed by executive committee (which is comprised of all members of city council) Wednesday afternoon, said the SUBP is not compatible with the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB), of which most of their laid-off employees are currently on.
Pursing the SUBP could result in a claw back of CERB, said the report, because the CERB only allows applicants to make up to $1,000 per month to qualify. It would also cost the city approximately $2 million, which would increase if the pandemic continues and employees remain on lay off beyond July 21. This would add to a projected deficit of more than $20 million by September due to the virus.
When asked by Ward 6 Coun. Joel Murray if administration would consider SUBP after the CERB program is over, Holden was noncommittal.
“Currently the CERB program is in place for 16 weeks. At the end of 16 weeks, the federal government may or may not extend that,” said Holden, then reiterating that as decisions around the resumptions of services and programs are made, employees on lay off are being recalled.
On April 15, council approved amended service levels and administration began recalling casual staff to support the delivery of those services.
By the end of May, it is expected that more than 375 casual employees will be recalled with approximately 370 casual employees remaining on lay off, according to the report.
The majority of those casual employees are from the city’s recreation and community centres, said Holden, which will not be reopening until phases three and four of the province’s reopen plan. The start dates for those phases are still to be determined.
However, administration’s report did say that as a federal or provincial wage subsidy program became available to municipalities, the city “would explore the feasibility of accessing the program.”
In a troubleshooting exploration, Ward 3 Coun. Andrew Stevens asked administration whether or not there has been a review of contracted services that could potentially be done by in-house workers that have been laid off instead.
According to administration, the city has been in talks with unions about how employees could be “redeployed,” something he said unions have provided some flexibility on.
So far, there have been 20 employees who have been redeployed, predominately in the recreation and culture services area.
No representatives from any of the three unions were present as delegations during Wednesday’s virtual meeting. The report will go before city council on May 27 for final discussion.