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Workers flood chambers, want more pay
Employees ask that their salaries be comparable to those in neighboring cities
By Kelly Wilkinson
Members of the largest city employee union--many dressed in their orange and green work shirts--filled council chambers at Tuesday night's meeting to demand higher wages.
A delegation of four representatives from the Sunnyvale Employees Association (SEA) spoke before councilmembers about the disparity between their workers' salaries and comparable position salaries in neighboring cities. In some instances, a gap of over 30 percent exists between the pay rate of Sunnyvale employees and employees with identical jobs in other cities, according to SEA president Benjamin Gitkas.
In a recent survey of Sunnyvale residents, Gitkas pointed to a 95 percent approval rating from residents, signaling overwhelming support for city workers' performance.
"And quality costs money," Gitkas said. "In order to hire and retain the best, you must pay competitive salaries or the service will deteriorate."
The SEA is the largest union of city employees, representing more than 500 positions in the city, from office assistants to tree planters to city planners. Contract negotiations began in January for a new contract which will replace the one that expires June 30.
Sunnyvale uses an average of 10 cities in the South and East Bay to arrive at SEA salaries, and union members want their salaries to reflect the higher end of that average due to higher living costs.
"This is Sunnyvale, and it costs more to live here," Gitkas said. "You can't attract good people on Richmond salaries."
Dave Nieto, director of human resources, said including East Bay cities in the benchmark average is commonplace for other city unions--including PSOA and the management--and added that the SEA agreed to the 10 survey cities in their contract negotiations three years ago.
"The SEA is now indicating that they feel we should not be using the exact same 10 cities," Nieto said. "It is the city's position that in surveying 7 to 14 cities, you're getting sufficient survey information to know what the real database looks like."
But Gitkas said that although his union agreed to the 10 survey cities, they do not agree with taking a straight average, since they feel they do above average work. And Nieto said city officials agree, to a point.
"We do believe that our SEA employees are highly valuable, and should be paid a wage that reflects that. As to what that percentage is, that's open," he said.
"Quite frankly, they do work that is of a higher level, and the logic would be that if we believe they work on a higher level, then they should be paid at a higher level. But to be paid at the average of the top three, that's a pretty significant jump."
Bob LaSala, city manager, agreed some workers' pay is below average and said all sides concur that the total compensation package--which includes salary and benefits--should be above average.
"We want to get caught up, stay caught up, and move ahead," he said. "And we want to do that before the current contract expires. I think that's important as a statement on both sides."
Gitkas also said the city's low salaries will negatively affect the caliber of hires, adding that in the last 10 years, the fire department has never had any applications from Palo Alto, Milipitas, or Santa Clara.
"How do you attract the best people in that situation?" he asked, referring to Sunnyvale paying less money than neighboring cities. "The best people aren't stupid, and if they come here for less, we've got to be wondering if we missed something in the interview."
Despite the differing positions on the negotiations, both sides acknowledged their commitment to working through the process, and mentioned "significant" gains made since the process began in January.
"There's not a lot of optimism right now," Gitkas said. "But we're trying to channel that into positive things and I think [Tuesday's presentation] was professional, and a real show of support."
"There have been significant discussions since January," Nieto said. "And we continue to make progress, even after last Tuesday."
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Sunnyvale, California Since 1994
