Metro Police officers, prosecutors in labor standoffs

By Joe Schoenmann

Sunday, June 5, 2011 | 2 a.m.

The labor tensions continue, as a second public employee union is at impasse with management.

Which one?

Last week, Clark County negotiators sent a letter to prosecutors in the district attorney’s office asking for an arbitrator’s help. The two sides had been negotiating for more than a year without reaching an agreement.

County prosecutors are some of the highest paid in the country, with total compensation averaging $165,529 in 2010. Their wages and benefits have increased 15 percent since 2009.

What other union is at impasse with management?

The union representing Metro Police officers, the Las Vegas Police Protective Association. The stalemate is notable because negotiations ended quickly in the two previous years, with officers agreeing not to receive cost-of-living increases and making other concessions, including cuts in training opportunities, which some officers use to supplement their pay.

This year, however, the budget situation for Metro is tighter.

Is that because tax revenue is down?

That’s the biggest reason.

At a March meeting of the Clark County Commission, Sheriff Doug Gillespie presented a $518 million budget, reflecting a 1.14 percent increase in spending. A day before, however, county administrators had asked all agencies to look for 9 percent cuts. A 1.14 percent increase, then, didn’t look so palatable. And Gillespie told commissioners that his scenario was “tentative.”

In April, he returned with a $501 million budget in which Las Vegas and Clark County, which fund 70 percent of Metro’s budget, would reduce their contribution by $27.6 million next fiscal year. To help offset the reduction, Metro would dip into its $80 million surplus, taking about $40 million. That fund typically supplements Metro’s budget and is replenished, but replenishment isn’t as likely in the next few years.

On top of that, Metro is to start making annual lease payments of $12.2 million for a new downtown headquarters. The building will eliminate some, but not all, of Metro’s lease payments for space across the county. Metro will continue lease payments of $4.1 million for offices that can’t be consolidated in the new building, while it eliminates lease payments totaling $4.6 million.

So that’s the budget in a nutshell. What’s happening with contract negotiations?

Sources say the Police Protective Association and management are “far apart” — perhaps as much as $11 million.

The sticking points this year are said to include: Officers being asked to absorb all of an increase in retirement contributions instead of paying half; the union had expected $5 million in clothing allowances, which were slashed a year ago, to be back on the table as an item to be negotiated. It wasn’t. In addition, sources say, Metro wants to cut pay by a few percentage points.

Another union aggravation is that members’ pay is slightly lower than smaller, neighboring police departments. Average total compensation, including insurance and retirement contributions, for a union member is $121,004, according to Metro. Total compensation for higher ranking officers, also unionized, averages $179,863. By comparison, compensation for North Las Vegas police union members, not including higher ranks, is $148,093. Henderson figures were not immediately available.