Columnist Jeff German: A different poll position

Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2005 | 8 a.m.

Jeff German's column appears Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday in the Sun. Reach him at german@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4067.

Unwilling to trust a Las Vegas Review-Journal poll on the subject of their pay raise fight, the cops commissioned their own public survey.

And, as you might imagine, the results are radically different than those reported last month by the R-J -- the newspaper the cops say is conspiring with county officials to spread misinformation about the pay hike.

The Las Vegas Police Protective Association, the union that represents some 2,400 officers, hired local pollster Marvin Longabaugh of Magellan Research to get them the straight story.

What Longabaugh found was that residents overwhelmingly support giving the Metro Police officers a 25.6 percent wage and benefits increase over the next four years.

Of the 801 registered voters interviewed from Nov. 6 through Nov. 13, a total of 60.8 percent said they supported the pay raise while 35.1 percent opposed it. The rest were undecided.

This is the compensation package that was rejected Oct. 24 by the Metro Fiscal Affairs Committee, which was dominated by county officials who thought the deal was too rich.

Dave Kallas, the PPA's executive director, said the Magellan Research results, which have a margin of error of 3.8 percent, prove to him that last month's R-J poll was skewed against the cops.

"This gives us a level of comfort," he said. "It lets us know that the overwhelming majority of residents of our community support us once they're presented with all the facts."

The R-J poll found that residents rejected the pay increase by a 54 to 35 percent margin, with 11 percent undecided.

But there was a big difference in the way the R-J's pollster, the Washington-based Mason-Dixon Polling & Research, asked the question.

Respondents in that survey were asked whether they supported a new contract that gives police a 40 percent pay hike over four years.

Kallas called this a "phantom figure" that he said the R-J has yet to properly explain to him.

"They just throw it out there to inflame people," he said. "They never give us any rationale for it."

In fairness to the R-J, the paper has explained that it arrived at the 40 percent figure by adding existing merit raises to the cost of living and pension hikes in the new contract. About two-thirds of the rank and file are eligible to receive these annual "step increases," which were negotiated several years ago.

Magellan Research's question on the compensation package was based on figures negotiated in the current talks.

"After eight months of negotiations," the question reads, "Sheriff Bill Young and the Police Protective Association had proposed a 16.75 percent pay raise to be implemented over a four-year period, along with a substantial increase in funding for health insurance benefits, resulting in a total increase of 25.6 percent over four years.

"Based on what you know right now, would you support the proposed police pay increase?"

The question is a mouthful, but it's as straightforward as it comes.

What's also intriguing is that, by a 61.7 to 29.6 percent margin, those surveyed by Magellan Research said the PPA was not out of line in filing a lawsuit and an open meeting law complaint against county officials for derailing the contract.

That didn't surprise Kallas.

"When you provide accurate information to residents, they're able to make an educated decision on how they truly feel about us," he said.

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