Tie vote torpedoes firefighter deal
WATERVLIET, N.Y. >> Members of the city’s Uniformed Firefighters Association will be forced to work under the same contract, at least for the time being.
The City Council was split at its Thursday night meeting in the two members’ vote on the proposed agreement, which, Mayor Michael Manning explained, results in the resolution’s defeat. The council is short one member as officials move to fill the seat of Nicholas Foglia, who resigned in Feb- ruary for personal reasons after seven years of service.
The council attempted to vote on the new three-year deal twice earlier this year, but Councilman Charles Patricelli had requested the vote be tabled both times so he could receive an outside legal opinion on its terms. The proposal would give firefighters 1-percent salary increases in each of the first two years of the deal, followed by a 1.5 percent raise in the final year.
After meeting with representatives from Goldberger & Kremer, the city’s legal consultants, Patricelli said he felt the city would not be able to afford the long-term cost of the contract and voted against the deal Thursday night.
“I asked for the outside legal counsel to help say, ‘ Hey Charles, is this a good plan or is this a bad plan,’” Patricelli explained. “‘ If it’s a good plan, tell me, and if it’s a plan that I can’t live with, then tell me why and we’ll go from there.’ He basically said, ‘ Hey, this plan is a very expensive plan, and it’s not a normal plan,’ and I felt it was a plan Watervliet could not afford.”
Patricelli said one of his primary concerns a new retirement package the union had asked for.
“The package is what they call the 384E,” Patricelli said. “It’s a Cadillac retirement package, it’s very expensive and we have to pay an enormous amount of money to buy into it. Over the course of the years, it’s an added expense and an added premium on our regular retirement package. It’s a very expensive package.”
Manning said he thought the contract was a fair agreement for both sides.
“We got some things that we needed to get that not only help short- term but help long-term,” Manning said
Union President Jody Legault attended Thursday’s meeting and disputed Patricelli’s assessment of the proposed deal.
“My big thing is that Councilman Patricelli stated that he didnt get any information in the timely manner, when it was definitely readily available,” Legault said Friday. “All he had to do was either make a phone call to us or reach out to his own team to get
the information.
Patricelli reiterated Friday he did not have the information he needed to make an informed vote.
“All the information that I had came to me piecemeal and toward the end of the presentation,” he said.
“I didn’t have all the information that I needed, whether or not it was in hard copy or with proper explanation. I don’t need to reach out to the union president for this; this comes from part of the city. Some of the information that I received was there, but it was kind of enormous to comprehend and understand, and that’s why I went to the labor attorney. I needed an unbiased person explaining
this to me.”
Unless the impasse can be resolved with further negotiations, the dispute may eventually be decided in arbitration, a move Legault said is unlikely to satisfy both sides.
“I am not sure where it is going to go from here,” Legault admitted. “Now, it is just unknown what arbibration is going to bring because we don’t know what will be ruled.”
Manning said he’s open to more bargaining, but admitted Patricelli holds the key to resolving the dispute.
“If we want to go back to the table, Councilman Patricelli has to quantify his why not part,” said Manning.